The Price of Vengeance
by sorahart
Summary: Diana was 8 years old when the Amazons were wiped out right before her eyes. Now she embarks on a quest for vengeance against the ones responsible for her people's demise. And the only one who can stop her... may also be the only one who shares her pain.
1. Dark Memories

Chapter One: Only the Beginning

_I was eight years old when it happened. Just an eight year old girl, training with some of the other Amazons on Themyscira. My mother and I were going to go horseback riding later. It was the first time she was going to let me handle my own horse. Then there was that loud noise, like a lion roaring in the sky, and they attacked. Now I know that they were fighter jets, and that they were shooting missiles at us. Back then, I thought they were dragons. The missiles wiped out our temples first, killing every one of my sisters in prayer. After that I was pushed aside by my older Amazon sisters, who tried to form an offensive. That was a bad idea. They waited for us to group together, and then fired more missiles._

_ I still don't know how they found us. I suppose I'll have to figure that out some day. But it really doesn't matter all that much, because regardless of how it happened, they found us. And they slaughtered us. I watched my sisters try to fight back, but arrows do little against tank armor, and battle armor does little against machine guns and flame throwers. By sunset, the bloodshed had almost reached its climax. Only my mother and Artemis were still on their feet. I was told to hide, but I stayed close anyway. I watched bullets tear into my mother's flesh. I watched her engulfed in a napalm fire. I saw her electrocuted several times. And I saw her keep fighting. She stayed on her feet no matter what they threw at her, and she even killed a lot of them._

_ Then he came. A helicopter brought him. The shape of his armor reminded me of a centaur. A sterling silver centaur. He had a sword. He and my mother clashed, but even she couldn't penetrate that armor. He knocked her on the ground, and he took off his helmet. I still remember that face. Suave, strong and handsome like Adonis. He had fiery hair and eyes like Hades. I remember his name too. His name was Maxwell Lord. The last thing I saw was Lord putting his blade through my mother's chest. I saw blood, and I heard her scream. I saw her hit the brick floor in a lifeless heap, sinking into a pool of her own blood. Then Artemis grabbed me. She was bleeding too, but still determined. She was always determined. Artemis pulled me away from the battlefield and forced me onto a boat. She threw blankets over me, and a few baskets of food. Then she pushed the boat off, and I heard her pray to Poseidon to carry me to safety._

_ I didn't see what happened to Artemis after that, but I heard gunshots. A lot of gunshots. I drifted on that small boat for almost four days. Most of my time was spent weeping. Then I was picked up by a fisherman with a much larger boat. He fed me and took me to shore. I lived in an orphanage until I was fifteen. After that, I escaped and went out into the world. That was where I learned that Themyscira, the land I had once called home, had been turned into a center for big business. There were fancy hotels, a large office building, and gods know what else. And it's all run by Lord Industries, one of the biggest multinational corporations on the planet, rivaling even Wayne Enterprises and LexCorp. And that's all run by Maxwell Lord. He butchered my people and took my home… and he used it as a starting ground for his meteoric rise to power. I hear he's even up for political office now._

_ Too bad he'll never get there. I spent the next half of my life training around the world. I learned every fighting style, mastered every weapon, I educated myself on everything a person would ever need to become a flawless killer. My name is Diana Prince. And I – Will – Kill him._

Diana closed her journal and put the pen back in its holder. She threw the journal into her bag, the only one she had brought, and tossed that against the wall. She would need to get it quickly. Diana gazed out the window of the dumpy little apartment she was renting under a false name. She wore rubber gloves and clean shoes at all times while in the apartment. She always at with plastic silverware, and threw it away in the park down the block when she was done. This was all to avoid leaving DNA traces behind. She had to be untraceable.

She saw the private helicopter with the Lord Industries logo, a red shield with a red sword and axe crossing in front of it. The helicopter went to land on top of the WayneTech building across town, where a private party among social elites would be held. There, Carl Holbert, one of the big financial head honchos for Lord Industries, would meet with Bruce Wayne, CEO of Wayne Enterprises, about a business deal between the two companies.

Diana moved to the safe in the closet of the apartment, dialed in the combination, opened the door, and began to withdraw her weapons. "Time to begin."

**WayneTech Building – One Hour Later**

"Mr. Holbert. I had assumed I would be meeting with Mr. Lord tonight." Bruce Wayne said casually.

"Unfortunately Mr. Lord was unable to attend. I am the head of finance for Lord Enterprises, though."

"I'm aware of your position." Bruce nodded. "So are you enjoying the little party I've thrown together?"

"A pleasant get together I suppose." Holbert said dryly, taking a sip from his glass of wine. "So shall we discuss this business deal of ours?"

"Let's get started on that."

The two men began to walk away, and soon they were too far for Diana to hear their conversation. That didn't matter. She knew enough. Diana spotted Alfred, Bruce's butler, across the room. She had done enough research to know it was him.

Diana got up from the table she had seated herself in, blending carefully among the dozens of wealthy socialites crowding the room. She acted as if she were headed towards the bathroom, and made sure to 'accidentally' bump into Alfred. And as she did so, she swiftly plucked the cell phone from his pocket.

"My apologies madam." Alfred said as she bumped him.

"It's quite alright." She smiled innocently. Then she walked into the bathroom, entered a stall, and began flipping through Alfred's contacts until she found Bruce Wayne. She hit the call button.

_"Alfred?" _Bruce's voice came in on the other end. Diana, doing a pitch-perfect imitation of Alfred's voice, spoke.

"Master Bruce, there is an urgent matter outside the building that I feel you should attend to." She had learned the art of voice manipulation from puppeteer in Taiwan.

_"What kind of matter?" _Bruce asked.

"A man attempting to steal your car." She lied effortlessly.

_"Typical. I suppose I'll go deal with it a moment. If you wouldn't mind coming and keeping Mr. Holbert company while I'm out?"_

"Oh, he will definitely have my attention sir." Diana pursed her lips.

_"Thank you Alfred."_

Diana hung up the phone call, and quickly tossed the phone into the toilet. Someone would find it eventually. Better their finger prints were on it then hers.

Then she ripped open an air duct above the stall, and crawled in through effortlessly. She snaked through the duct until she found the vent above the hallway, in which the door leading to the meeting room was. She looked through the grate and saw the office door come open. Bruce Wayne stepped out casually but quickly. "My apologies Mr. Holbert. My butler will be coming to keep you company while I'm gone."

Once Diana knew that Bruce was well out of earshot, she kicked open the grate and dropped down into the hall. She opened up the door to find Carl Holbert looking bored in an office chair. "Who are you?" He asked suspiciously.

"I'm the entertainment." She smiled.

"Bruce said the butler was coming."

"Well, I'm not a butler… but I _can _keep you company." She said seductively, moving over to him.

"What is this…?"

"Mr. Wayne likes to make sure all of his guests are very, very comfortable." Diana sat on the man's lap; doing everything she could to hide her disgust. "Comfy?" She leaned in and whispered in his ear. "I for one would be a lot more comfy with my clothes off."

"I'm beginning to like this business transaction." Holbert gave a smile, and his beady little eyes bulged. He was sweaty and eager. Diana wanted to punch him then and then there, but she needed to maintain the façade just a little longer. She had to finish the job where there were no cameras watching.

"You know, I have some _things _in my car that might make us both a lot more… _comfortable_."

"I like the sound of that." Holbert's face reddened.

"Follow me." She motioned playfully. He obeyed. Diana led him into the parking garage. "So which car is yours?"

"I came in a helicopter." He bragged. "It's on the helipad just above this garage, actually."

"Oh. We might have to check out the cockpit." She gave him a dazzling fake smile. She opened up the hood of the car she had rented under a fake name, and pulled out a pair of handcuffs.

"Handcuffs?" Holbert snickered. "I like where this is headed."

"Close your eyes." Diana said. She kissed him, and that was a horrible, horrible experience. But it would pay off in a moment. There was a loud metallic click, and Diana pulled away. Holbert quickly realized that she had handcuffed him to the car! Diana began to walk away.

"Hey! What is this?"

"Revenge, bastard!" Diana spun around and punched him in the jaw, hearing bone shatter. She pulled back with blood on her knuckles. Then she headed for the door, and from her purse she pulled out a small detonator. She hit the red button, and it triggered the several small explosives she had placed in the ceiling of the parking garage. There was a series of loud explosions, and the ceiling above Carl Holbert crumbled!

His private helicopter came crashing down, and with a scream, Holbert was crushed to death by his own helicopter.

Blood pooled around the floor of the parking garage. Soon people would come running to see what the crash was. They would find Holbert dead. And Diana would already be gone.

She had many targets. All of the big shots in Lord Enterprises were on her list. And this was only the beginning.


	2. Roadkill

Chapter Two: Roadkill

Diana went in the apartment through the window. She washed the blond dye out of her hair, and removed the green colored eye contacts. She took a quick step into the shower to wash off the spray-on tan.

Soon she was able to look in the mirror and see her regular dark haired, blue eyed, fair skinned reflection. She no longer needed the disguise. She burned the dress she had worn to the party. If it wasn't in her wardrobe, it couldn't be identified as hers. Once all was said and done, she grabbed her bag and left for good.

**WayTech Building**

"Who is she?" Alfred asked as they watched the surveillance tapes, pointing to a tan blond woman in a red dress.

"I wish I knew. Certainly no one I invited." Bruce studied her. He quickly paused the footage at the point where the woman bumped into Alfred during the party. He zoomed in, and saw what he expected. She stole Alfred's phone.

"My word!" Alfred's eyes widened. "And I had just learned how to text!"

"Just as I thought. She must've called me from your phone. She did a perfect impersonation though… she even nailed your speech patterns and mannerisms, as well as your voice. We're looking at a very, very skilled actress."

"She got you out of the meeting room so she could be alone with Holbert." Alfred nodded.

"Then she led him into the parking garage, where she had this whole trap set up. Handcuffed him to a rental car, blew up the roof and crushed him underneath his own helicopter."

"I would find out who had the rental car."

"I already checked. It was under a false ID. An expertly crafted one. She had everything from fake medical records down to fake divorce papers from a fake husband. Even I was almost convinced that this person existed."

"So she's untraceable then." Alfred stated.

"Not quite. I dug into it a little more, and it turns out that a small apartment in the area was bought with the same fake ID just three days ago. This woman is obviously smart; I doubt she'll still be there. But that doesn't mean she didn't leave a clue. I just have to get over there and find it."

"Sounds like I should finish patching the bullet holes in your Batman suit."

"I agree."

Bruce's JLA communicator began to sound. With a groan, he answered it. "Batman." He said simply.

_"I trust you're investigating the murder at your building last night?"_ J'onn's voice came through.

"What about it?"

_"There's been another killing."_

"What?" Bruce stood up quickly.

_"It happened in Central City this afternoon. I investigated a bit. The victim was Henry Bradshaw, one of the board members at Lord Industries."_

"Interesting. The first victim was Lord Industries' Financial Executive. Doubt its just coincidence."

_"_Precisely_."_

"Can we be sure it was the same killer?"

_"The murderer was a woman. She impersonated a hooker that Bradshaw had hired, so he allowed her into his car. She then stabbed his driver and kicked Bradshaw through the rear window. He was run over by several vehicles on the highway."_

"What happened to the car?"

_"It drove off a bridge and into the lake. Emergency crews recovered the car, but not the killer."_

"Sounds like her." Bruce nodded.

_"Do you think perhaps we are dealing with an assassin? Someone hired to take out Lord Industries board members?"_

"I don't think so. If it were an assassin, she would have killed Carl Holbert in the WayneTech meeting room and left. Instead she manipulated him, humiliated, and brutally crushed him underneath his private helicopter. She made sure to draw attention, like a public display of his murder. That wasn't a paid assassin. That was an act of revenge."

_ "So how do you propose we go about this?"_

"If I'm not mistaken, there's a big press conference in Metropolis tonight where the head of Lord Industries' technology department will be unveiling a new product."

_"And you think the killer will be there?"_

"One of Lord Industry's big shots in a public place, with millions of people watching? I'm confident she'll show up."

_"I'll have Superman, Barda and Flash patrolling the area."_

"You do that. I'll investigate her apartment." Batman agreed, then turned off the communicator and headed for his suit.

**Metropolis – Three Hours Later**

The stage had been set, and the large crowd gathered in Metropolis Square eagerly awaited news of the new product coming from Lord Industries.

Soon, Christopher Duvall, head of Lord Industry's electronics department, stepped up to the microphone. The crowd cheered. He waited for it to quiet down a little, and then began to speak. "Ladies and gentlemen, how many of you have smart phones?" He asked exuberantly. Thousands cheered. "That's what I thought. But now… is it _really _smart?" He picked up a device in the palm of his hand, and the large screens behind him zoomed in on it. "Meet the PalmLord. It comes equipped with actually AI that will constantly adapt to the user's habits and activities. Within a month of ownership, your PalmLord will be performing tasks for you, such as automatically setting alarms to your usual wake up times, silencing itself when you enter meeting rooms, etc."

As the crowd roared over this, Diana watched from the top-floor window of a nearby building. She stared at her target a few seconds longer, drowning out his words and focusing on how much she hated him. She hated him because he worked alongside Maxwell Lord. And because of that he had to be punished.

Diana readied her modified compound bow, and stared closely at her target through the scope. In just a moment, millions of people would witness him die. It would be a quick arrow through the neck. She'd hit the jugular to ensure there would be a lot of blood. She wanted to make her mark. She wanted to be sure that no one would ever forget the sight. And by the time anyone got over their shock and tried to trace where the arrow had come from, she would be gone.

Diana pulled back on the bow string, taking carefully aim, and fired. There was a loud thud as the string snapped forward, and the heavy duty arrow was launched toward the unsuspecting Christopher Duvall with incredible speed.

And then, just before it would have hit, a ruby red beam of heat vision sliced through the air and incinerated the arrow! The security saw this and quickly grabbed Duvall, taking him to his bullet proof limousine, and as soon as he was in the driver took off.

"Damn it!" Diana growled. She threw down the bow and sprinted through the empty room. A thundering crash erupted behind her as Superman blasted through the wall! "Stop!" He demanded as he touched down directly in front of her. "I don't want to have to hurt you."

"Alright." Diana raised up her hands with a defeated sigh. "I know when I've lost."

Superman moved behind her and grabbed her wrists, hoping to secure her. And then was when she flung him forward with shocking strength! She smashed Superman against the wall and kicked him hard in the ribs. He got on his feet more quickly than she had expected. She cart wheeled up, planted her hands on his shoulders, and bounded up with tremendous force. She flipped in the air and landed a kick in the middle of his back, knocking him down and launching her through the window. Diana began a freefall toward the streets.

She hit the concrete gracefully, landing on her feet without any damage to speak off, and ran for the crowded subway where she knew Superman wouldn't find her easily. Pushing through the crowd, Diana literally leapt on top of a moving train, gaining a foothold quickly. She stood firm on the roof the subway train as it rode through the long subway tunnels.

Now that she had some relief, she pulled out a GPS tracker from her built and checked the screen. She had placed a tracking device on Christopher Duvall's limo, just in case he got away from her at the conference. The fast moving blip on the screen indicated that they were heading to the outskirts of the city, probably to a safe house. And on the same route as the police station…

Her thoughts were interrupted when she saw the reflection of a large blue blob in the screen. She spun around quickly with a roundhouse kick and caught Superman in the face. She heard another train coming. It was about to pass the one they were on, moving back toward the station. Diana quickly tossed a flash pellet from her tool belt. It struck Superman's face and exploded into a bright, blinding light. Superman screamed as his vision was blackened out.

Diana then leapt off of the train, and clung to the side of the passing one. By the time Superman regained his vision, she was gone.

Once the second train arrived back at the station, Diana jumped off and sprinted up the stairs, back into the city streets. She ducked into an alley and started to run, when a quick orange blur struck her in the side. She was knocked into a wall, when another blur hit her in the face.

The Flash materialized in front of her. "I don't like hitting girls, so if you could please surrender…?" He tried.

Diana launched a kick at him, but Flash dodged and broke into a sprint again, causing Diana to lose sight of him. She saw a wooden door with a window built into it, leading into an old, closed down antique shop. Diana ripped the door off of its hinges and smashed the window, scattering shards of glass all over the narrow alley. A straight line of glass shards began to crush, and Diana new that Flash was running over them.

She waited until the shard nearest to her broke, and flung the door forward, hitting Flash in the chest! She slammed him against the wall and easily dislocated his knee, before backhanding him across the face and leaving him unconscious. "Too easy." Diana cracked her.

"Oh yeah? Try me!" A powerful voice bellowed, and Diana looked over just in time to be punched in the face Big Barda! Diana hit the floor and looked up.

"What the hell are you supposed to be?"

"The Justice League's muscle." Barda growled, and stomped down toward Diana! She rolled away just in time and delivered a punch, knocking the taller woman back. Superman arrived back on the scene to aid Barda in the conflict. A few police cars began to approach.

"Alright." Diana sighed. She dropped her tool belt to the ground and put her hands against the wall. "For real this time."

"What?" Superman raised an eyebrow.

"I know I can't beat both of you. I might as well spare myself a beating." Diana shrugged.

"Look at that, she's smart." Barda laughed. She restrained Diana easily, not that Diana actually fought back at all. Barda then delivered Diana to the armored police van, and handed her over. The murderous woman was quickly handcuffed and thrown in the back of the van, a defeated look on her face.

"Well that was easy." Barda shrugged as they drove away.

"Too easy." Superman shook his head. "Something wasn't right."

**Gotham – Apartment Building**

Bruce had swept over the apartment the killer had rented four times now, but hadn't found anything even resembling a clue. The woman had been careful not to leave any DNA traces, or anything else that could serve as an identifier. The only thing he had really found were some traces of hair dye in the sink, and spray-tan residue in the shower. Not even enough to draw skin or hair samples from.

_Great. All I've learned as that I don't know what she really even looks like. _He thought.

His communicator began to sound. "Batman." He answered.

_"It's Clark. Barda and I apprehended the assassin, Christopher Duvall got out safely."_

"Good. I haven't found anything useful in her apartment. Any clues about her identity?"

_"Other than the fact that she's a Meta? No."_

"Meta?"

_"Yes. Her strength was almost on par with mine, and she leapt out of a twelve story building without so much as a scratch. Not to mention her reflexes were incredible."_

"Interesting. Where is she now?"

_"In an armored van being taken to Stryker's. But Bruce, there's something else…"_

"What?"

_"She got away from me twice. She took down Flash, and I'm confident she could have beaten Barda. But as soon as she saw police cars, she just gave up. It was almost like she wanted to be arrested."_

"Strange. Keep an eye on the situation."

_"Already on it."_

Batman nodded and deactivated the communicator. He was just about to leave the apartment, when he noticed something strange. The wall space made for the closet was almost two feet larger than the actual closet. This struck him as odd, since space is rarely wasted when building apartments, being small as they are. He moved inside the empty closet to take a closer look. There was a trap door in the bottom of the back wall. He pried it open, and found a safe.

"Strange…" He muttered. After a moment of lock-picking, he opened up the safe. As he did so, there was a popping noise. His eyes widened when inside the safe, he saw a single grenade. The pin had been tied to a string, the other end of said string tied to the door of the safe. And in pulling the door open, he had also pulled out the pin!

Swiftly Batman doubled around and sprinted for the window. As he leapt through the glass, the grenade exploded and the apartment went up in flames behind him! Batman glided away from the fire and landed on the ledge of the next building. He looked back at the fire with interest. She had set a trap.

Whoever this woman was, she was smart. And he had a feeling that this was only the beginning.

**Metropolis Highway – Twenty Minutes Later**

Metropolis Police were used to dealing with metahumans on the job. Diana had been searched thoroughly for weapons, then her hands and feet were both cuffed. Now she sat in the back of the armored truck, behind watched by two guards armed with submachine guns.

Diana had been doing the math in her head. Judging by the speed at which the vehicle was traveling, compared to the speed of the limousine, they were almost right where she wanted…

Diana purposefully bit her tongue. Hard. Blood started to gush, and she spat it out onto her chin. She reacted as if there were a severe stomach problem, as if she were actually coughing up blood!

Naturally, one of the guards rushed over to see what was wrong. As soon as he knelt down in front of her, she flung her forehead forward, smashing his visor! She quickly got up and looped her handcuffs around his neck, spinning him around in front of her as the second guard fired his gun. The bullets tore into his partner, and the shooting guard stepped back in horror. Diana took advantage of his. She snapped the handcuffs over the guards neck, grabbed his fallen gun, and threw it across the truck!

The gun hit the second guard in the throat, causing him to drop to the floor. She kicked him unconscious, and pulled one of his side arms from his belt. A small shotgun. She emptied out all of the shells. She then carefully but quickly disassembled the shells, emptying all the gunpowder into the palm of her hand. Then she pulled out the guard's lighter. He was a smoker. She used it to heat up the bulletproof steel wall in front of her to dangerous levels.

She stepped back and sighed. "Gods this is going to hurt…" She pulled back with her palm, still full of gunpowder, and launched it forward. The palm struck the red-hot section on the wall, igniting all of the gunpowder at once.

There was an earsplitting blast, and Diana felt immense pain as the force of the explosion broke bone in her arm. Her skin had survived with only a few relatively minor burns. And she had successfully blown a hall through the wall in front of her!

"What the hell?" The driver of the truck shouted as the hole blew through right next to his head! Diana grabbed the hole with her good hand and ripped it open further. The driver fumbled for his gun, but he was too late. Diana crawled painfully into the passenger side and kicked the driver with both feet, launching him straight through the door on his side! He went tumbling into the road, and air started rushing through the gap where the door had once been.

They were on a highway. Diana looked down to see Christopher Duvall's bulletproof limousine, about to drive underneath the overpass. Diana grabbed the wheel with her good arm, and jerked the truck right off of the highway!

The five ton armored truck performed a nosedive, and sailed directly onto the limo she had aimed for! The van crushed the limo, and everything inside. Everyone inside. There were startled screams, but only for a moment. Then blood started to leak through the limo's windows. Diana rolled out through the gap where the driver's side door had once been, and walked away from her latest kill as a crowd began to form, holding her broken arm.

Three down. Just a few left. Then she could take down Lord himself.


	3. Eyes of Vendetta

Chapter Three: Eyes of Vendetta

"Who is she?" Bruce Wayne stared at the blurry image that street cameras had captured in the midst of the last assassination. She had long dark hair, fair skin, and all black clothing. Something tugged in the back of Bruce's mind, something seemed familiar about her, but he couldn't pinpoint exactly what it was. He had hacked into the mainframe at the Department of Metahuman Affairs and searched all their files. There was nothing on her. He'd run her face through the database a hundred times, but there were no matching results.

No matter where he looked, every search seemed to result in a dead end. There was no information to be found on this woman, and no indication whatsoever as to why she was killing off Lord Industries board members. Bruce had ruled out the possibility that she was a paid assassin, that didn't add up. When she made a kill, she seemed to like letting it be known to the public. She liked to kill in elaborate, eye-catching ways that people would never forget.

She wanted to make her mark. Whatever her reason for killing, it was definitely personal. "Master Bruce, when was the last time you slept?" Alfred inquired as he approached with a cup of coffee for the dark knight.

"What day is it?"

"Friday."

"Then I slept on Wednesday morning."

"My point exactly." Alfred set the coffee down next to Bruce. "Please try and get some rest."

"I need to figure out who this woman is Alfred. She's outsmarted me twice now; she took down Flash, and got away from Clark and Barda without any trouble. How many other villains have we ever encountered, who have managed something like that? And we don't even have the slightest inclination as to who she is!"

"I've seen you obsess many times before Master Bruce, but never quite like this." Alfred leaned forward with a smile. "You almost seem intimidated. Is it possible that the Batman has finally met his match?"

"She played me for a fool at the WayneTech building Alfred, and in the apartment I walked right into her trap. She's intelligent."

"So is Lex Luthor, and you never get so worked up over him."

"Lex can't beat Barda and Superman in a fistfight."

"Well I may not be a detective like yourself, but I have read my share of novels. And do you know what I have concluded?"

"What Alfred?"

"The number one reason that a crime can't be solved is that the sleuth investigates the wrong aspect of the case."

"What are you getting at…?"

"Perhaps you shouldn't be investigating this woman's identity." Alfred looked up at the picture on the screen. "Perhaps you should be investigating her target."

**Train – Same Time**

Ivan Andrews, the event's manager for Lord Industries, talked loudly on his cell phone while boarding the train. His private jet was currently under maintenance, and he refused to fly while crammed in with the common people, so he had bought his own personal car on the train in order to make his travel to a conference in Maine.

"…10:00. Yes, p.m. That's when the test is scheduled, and it's too late to change it. Well I guess your daughter's wedding will have to wait, you either show up for the test or you lose your job. Got it?" Ivan hung up the call, and immediately began calling another number. He had a lot of arrangements that needed to be made, and his secretary was on maternity leave, making it all his job alone.

While punching in the phone number, he bumped into a woman hard enough to incite a startled groan from both of them. "Pay attention, bitch!" Ivan spat.

"My apologies sir." The woman smiled at him innocently, chocolaty dark hair tumbling down her face. "Completely my fault."

"Whatever." He pushed past her and continued his conversation. The woman simply grinned, and after a moment turned to follow.

Within ten minutes, Ivan was in his private train car, and sat down on one of the chairs. A heated debate arose between him and client he was texting. In his line of work, Ivan had grown to despise everyone but himself. As Lord Industries event's manager, he had to set up meetings, appointments, press conferences and anything else that came up. He was constantly cutting corners and making compromises to meet everyone's needs and/or desires.

And it had instilled in him a bitter hatred of humanity. He was nothing but a glorified secretary, and he knew it. That only added to the bitterness. He had a fancy title, a good paycheck, but at the end of the day, he was nothing but Maxwell Lord's bitch.

Ivan contemplated all of this when suddenly; there was a knock on the door. That seemed very strange, considering he was on a moving train. Slowly and irritably, Ivan walked toward the door and looked through the small window, trying to figure out what was going on. There was no one there. But the glass had been fogged up by someone's breathe, and written in it by someone's finger were the words; **Stay away from the right window.**

He read this just moments before the fog on the glass began to dissipate. _Stay away from the right window? What the hell does that mean? _Ivan turned around and looked to the window on the right side of his car. And he felt rage fester inside of his chest, growing with each beat of his heart.

Ivan exploded. He was done cutting corners to please everyone else, done making compromises and done bending over backwards to make people happy. No more of it. Ivan was done listening. Quickly, Ivan stormed toward the window with a bright red face. Upon reaching the window, he found another message. It simply read, **I warned you. **

And then, before Ivan could even process the words he had just finished reading, a hand burst through the glass and gripped him by the throat. Any chances Ivan had of screaming were choked out of him immediately, leaving only an inward rush of terror throughout his rather small body. Ivan was forced violently out through the window, and jerked upward.

By the time his vision recovered, he was on top of the train. The noise was nearly deafening, and the rushing wind peeled back his cheeks and stung his eyes. Standing above him was a woman, tall and bearing a near-malevolent grin. Her eyes were a sparkling blue color, but cold. Cold as if the fire in them had long since been extinguished, and all feeling had been drained out of her gaze. Only pain and anger remained within the depths of her jaded, unfeeling stare.

Ivan noticed the sleek black bodysuit she wore, coupled with the long, flowing black hair that blew in the wind. _That woman! _He remembered bumping into her outside the train. He remembered calling her a bitch and blowing off her apology. "I'm sorry!" He screamed over the wind, tears streaming down his face. "I'm sorry, really. I should have been more careful. I-"

"Shut up." The woman snapped with an air of dominance. He realized that she was holding him in place with her foot on his chest, and he was completely confident that she could kill him with a single downward step. "I want to know something Ivan. And as soon as you tell me, I'll let you go."

"Anything." He wept.

"The _test _tonight. What are they testing, where is it, and who will be there?"

"I can't tell you… I'll lose my job, I could do jail time, I-" Before Ivan could choke out another word; the woman grabbed him by the ankles and hung him off the side of the train, lowering his head toward the track.

"Still worried about your job?"

"Just don't kill me! Please don't kill me!"

"Answer me then."

"Ok! Ok! I'll talk."

The woman pulled him upward and slammed him back down on top of the train. "Lets start with question one. What are they testing?"

"Weaponry."

"What kind of weaponry? I want specifics."

"I don't know any specifics! I just organize the events, I don't get details. All I know is that its weaponry being tested for the military, that's all I have, I swear."

"Where?"

"The Lord Industries testing grounds."

"In Russia?"

"Yes, the Russian steppes. Away from civilization to ensure there won't be civilian casualties."

"Or witnesses." Diana growled. "Who will be there?"

"Boris Makarov, the operator of the testing facility, and Dillon Jameson, the head of Lord Industries' weaponry production department. And probably some military officials too."

"What about Maxwell Lord? Will he be there?"

"I doubt it. With board members dropping like flies, Mr. Lord is refraining from public events." Ivan answered honestly, and when the last answer spilled out of his mouth and he remembered the recent murders among company officials, he realized just who he was dealing with. The killer.

"Please let me live! Please, I'll do anything, I swear!"

7 "Don't worry. You aren't on my list." The woman knelt down and looked him in the eyes. "I'm only after the guilty ones. You were employed only a few years ago, you don't even know what happened."

"What are you talking about…?"

"We'll be in touch, Ivan Andrews. For future reference, my name is Diana."

Then she threw Ivan back into his train car, where he could have his panic attack. And Diana was gone, headed for her next target.

**Russian Steppes – 10:00 p.m.**

The batplane sailed over the large building built about a hundred miles away from the testing grounds. It was where the weaponry would be shipped from. Batman had taken Alfred's advice and done a little digging into Lord Industries. It turned out that their center of business, known by most as Paradise Island or Lord Island, was completely unrecorded.

There were absolutely no records of the island even existing prior to Lord Industries' start up a couple decades before, when Maxwell Lord launched his meteoric rise to power. This was strange in and of itself. Most companies didn't send out trained search groups to locate a brand new island in the middle of the Bermuda Triangle, just to get the business started.

It didn't make sense. The dark knight planned to investigate further, but first he wanted to investigate the weaponry division. There were several conspiracies floating around that Lord Industries deals to terrorist groups as well as the U.S. Military, and some even say they triggered wars with the Middle East in order to make a larger weapons profit from both sides.

It was a stretch, but definitely worth investigating. Batman descended silently from the batplane, gliding gently with his cape, and landed atop the building where the new weaponry would be collected and taken to the steppes.

Batman quickly scanned the building, and located what had to be Boris Makarov's office. He crept to the skylight above the office, and looked through the glass to see Boris conversing with Dillon Jameson, head of the Lord Industries weaponry department serving directly underneath Maxwell Lord himself.

Batman took a device from his utility belt, a small sonic transmitter which would pick up sound vibrations in the glass, read it and feed the conversation into Batman's earpiece. He placed the transmitter onto the glass skylight, and the vibrations from the two men speaking moved through the glass easily.

The transmitter read them, and fed the conversation to Batman. "…Insane! I cannot condone this!" Dillon was saying.

"You and I both work for the same man, but our roles in his business differ greatly Mr. Jameson. You are a man of business, and me… I am a man of action. Action must be taken, and therefore what must be done will be done." Boris argued.

"You aren't listening to me! Do you realize how many people will be killed?"

"I will kill as many as it takes in order for progress to advance, Mr. Jameson. The explosive effects of the missile have already been tested; it is the chemical aspect that needs further experimentation. Chemicals cannot be tested on rocks and trees, Dillon. They must be tested on the thing they are intended to kill; people."

"So you would just launch a missile on an unsuspecting village? A village full of children?"

"I would destroy a thousand villages in the name of progress. If society continues to allow ethics to hold back its science, then we can never advance to our full potential. Tonight morality will take a backseat. I will wipe out an entire village just to see how well it will work, and I will go to bed with a clear conscious. Because the end result is progress, the end result is the advancement of humankind. And therefore, the deed is necessary."

"You're out of your mind Makarov!"

"And you are no longer needed, Dillon."

Then, without warning, Makarov withdrew a pistol and shot Dillon Jameson in the forehead. Blood plastered the walls, and Jameson fell dead on the floor. Makarov looked to one of his guards. "Dispose of the body. Erase all records of his existence. And load the missile, I want to be ready to launch in twenty minutes."

Then Boris Makarov exited the room. Batman pulled the transmitter away from the glass with a scowl on his face. The dark knight withdrew a canister of explosive gel from his utility belt, and sprayed a bat insignia onto the glass of the skylight. Then he took a step back, and pressed the detonator.

There was an ear-splitting blast as the glass was blasted downward toward the two guards in the room, pelting them with broken shards and engulfing them in a haze of smoke. Batman leapt through the skylight planted his feet onto the head of one of the guards, kicking him out immediately.

Batman then spun around and found the second guard stumbling through the smoke, shotgun in hand. Batman grabbed the barrel and snapped it back, tearing the gun from the guard's hands. Then Batman launch a devastating fist toward the guard's face.

But to the dark knight's surprise, a palm came up and easily blocked his strike, gripping his fist like it was a rock. "Ooh, so close." The male guard taunted, but in a feminine voice.

"What the…?" Batman's eyes widened. The guard spun around with incredible speed and kicked Batman in the midriff, launching him forcefully into a computer desk. The guard reached up and pulled off his hat, revealing dark hair tied back in a tight bun. He untied it quickly, allowing the hair to fall freely down his back. Then the guard began pulling off his face, and Batman quickly realized that it was a synthetic skin compound.

The real skin underneath the fake layer was darker, and cleaner. Once the synthetic skin had been stripped off, Batman realized that he was looking at a woman. The same woman who had assassinated three Lord Industries board members so far. The same woman who had outsmarted him and escaped the Justice League.

And now, she had managed to trick him a third time. The woman stripped off her guard uniform, revealing the sleek black one that Batman recognized. Skin-tight, but armed to the teeth with hidden weapons. "Who are you?" Batman demanded.

"The subtle one here, apparently." Then she pulled a shuriken, or throwing star, from her belt and whipped it toward the alarm mechanism. The mechanism was destroyed, and the alarm began to blare loudly. "Gotta' run. I suggest you do the same." Then she leapt gracefully out the window, disappearing into the darkness, leaving behind a small bomb.

Batman got to his feet as a team of armed guards burst in the door to see what had triggered the alarm. The moment they did, the bomb exploded. And all of them were killed.

**Missile Transfer Station**

Boris Makarov watched through the bulletproof glass as the experimental missile was carefully transferred into the silo. The room was filled with over thirty armed guards, and fifteen scientists oversaw the procedure**. **"Soon we will be ready to launch, and the village will be no more." He said.

"I couldn't care less about the village Makarov, all I want to know is how effective this missile will be at killing. The U.S. Government wanted an alternative to nuclear weapons, something more concentrated but just as powerful, so that they could use it without fear of a nuclear winter. And if I can make it happen, there's a wonderful paycheck awaiting me." Maxwell Lord said, his image on the TV screen behind Boris. Lord wasn't there, of course, but he could still observe the results of their test.

The missile was almost ready to launch, when suddenly an arrow sailed out from the air vent, and pierced the neck of Boris Makarov's decoy down on the floor! The decoy fell dead in a pool blood, and the guards were immediately prepared to attack.

The real Boris smiled, and he looked back at the video image of Maxwell. "She is here."

Diana whipped out a series of four grenades, scattering them around the room and watching the guards scatter. It was a very big room, and the grenades didn't manage to actually eliminate any of the guards, but it certainly scrambled them. And that was all Diana needed.

She sailed downward with two thin, three-foot swords in her hands. She had quickly realized that the man she killed was only a decoy. That was a setback. Diana planted the blade into a guard's neck, dropping him immediately. She then dodged a flare of bullets, and slashed the shooter across the stomach.

She spun around quickly and kicked away a guard about to shoot her, and quickly found herself avoiding more blasts. Diana pierced the chest of one guard, and in the reflection on his visor, saw the image of Boris Makarov above them. Diana jerked her head upward to see Boris watching over them behind a window. "Coward…" Diana muttered.

She moved in to take out another guard, but then a bullet flashed into her hand, bring out a spout of blood. Diana let out a small cry and dropped on of her blades. And as she was recovering from this, a high-voltage tazer pierced into the small of her back. Then another, and another.

Soon a total of eight tazers had penetrated her body. This would easily kill most men, and was enough to drop Diana to her knees, convulsing violently as her muscles spasmed with unbelievable waves of pain. Diana lost her ability to move, and soon every gun in the room was trained in on her. Boris's voice came on over the intercom. "I must admit that your efforts have impressed me, assassin. But this is where your life comes to an end."

Just as the guards were about to open fire, there was a thundering blast on the far wall, and the concrete wall crumbled. A large black form emerged from it, roaring loudly… the Batmobile.

"What the hell is that?" One guard shouted.

"I think it's a tank!" Another yelled out.

The Batmobile tore into the room and mowed down a team of guards who had gotten confident and opened fire on it. The Batmobile then swerved and struck down another pair of shooters, before a set of small missiles rolled out from the sides, and fired across the room. Guards scattered, and the force of the small explosion blew them across the room.

"Nice timing." Diana grinned. Then she looked up at the window. Boris had already disappeared. Diana flew upward, shattered the glass, and sprinted after him.

One guard came out with an RPG, and launched the rocket propelled grenade right at the Batmobile. There was a blinding explosion, and the vehicle swerved. A second RPG shot from another soldier launched it upward, and the third blast hit the underside of the Batmobile, blowing it apart.

The heavily armored vehicle crumbled apart, and the remaining guards sprinted over to finish off the driver. But they found no one inside. And on what had been the dashboard, the auto-pilot light was on. "Damn it!" A guard kicked the ruined Batmobile, and suddenly the light turned red. An automated voice announced, **Initiating Self-Destruct Sequence.**

Immediately, everyone scattered as the room was torn apart by the blast.

**Upper Level**

Boris Makarov sprinted down the hallway that would lead to the staircase that he could climb to the roof. There, he could get to his private helicopter and escape. Out the corner of his eye, he saw something black blurring after him. Boris pulled out his pistol and began shooting wildly. "Get away!"

Once he was finally out of ammo, breathing heavily, a firm hand planted itself on his shoulder. Boris's eyes opened wide as a strong figure shoved him forward, bashing him against the steel wall. "It's over Makarov." Batman said commandingly.

"That is where you are wrong, _Batman_." Boris spat. "For if there is one thing that I learned while in the KGB, it is that nothing is ever over until either you are dead, or the mission is complete. And dying is not an option for me."

Boris then fumbled a small cylinder from his sleeve, and jammed it into Batman's thigh, emitted a deadly electric pulse. The dark knight stumbled, and Boris elbowed him in the jaw.

Before Batman could retaliate, Boris was sprinting up the flight of stairs. He burst through a heavy steel door and stepped onto the roof, eyeing his helicopter as if it were the most beautiful thing he had ever seen.

Boris sprinted to the helicopter and leapt into the cockpit. But when he attempted to start the helicopter, nothing happened. "You should have stayed with Batman." A woman's voice hissed in his ear. Boris jerked his head back to see Diana behind him.

Diana ripped Boris from the cockpit and flung him out onto the concrete roof, breaking several of his ribs upon impact. She walked toward him slowly, casually. "What do you want from me?" He demanded.

"I only want your blood." Diana stared him down.

"What have I ever done to you?"

"Do you even remember Themyscira?"

"What?"

"The island. The one who you and the rest of the board members at Lord Industries built a mercenary army to invade. The one full of women who you slaughtered in cold blood, just to start your company!"

"The island… how- how do you know about the island?"

"I was there, bastard!" Diana kicked him hard in the already broken ribs, inciting a scream.

"I- I am sorry…" He pleaded.

"No. You're not."

"You…" Boris whimpered. "You… are correct." Suddenly a wicked smile crossed over his face, and he rolled over with a gun in hand, which he had probably pulled from his boot. He pulled the trigger and blasted Diana in the chest. With a flash and a bang, Diana stumbled back, blood soaking her suit.

Boris got on his feet and shot her again, putting her on the ground. Then he aimed the gun at her face, blood dripping from her mouth, and prepared to pull the trigger. Then a bolo wrapped around his arm just as he was squeezing his finger. His arm was jerked upward, and the bullet sailed into the gas tank of his helicopter. The resulting wave of heat and fire blew Boris back.

He spun around and was greeted by a punch from the dark knight. His nose erupted into a fountain of blood as Batman's fist made contact. Boris hit the cement. "You again?" Diana got on her feet.

"This is over. Give it up. Both of you." Batman growled.

Diana walked forward, still bleeding from her bullet wounds, but it seemed as if it didn't even hurt anymore. "I really didn't need you to come and rescue me. Two bullets is nothing more than a flesh wound, really."

"I'm not rescuing anyone. I'm taking you both in." The dark knight glared.

"That's an interesting notion. But I'm afraid not." Diana suddenly blurred forward and kicked Batman down. She turned with a knife in hand and swung down toward Boris, but Batman spun around and kicked out her legs.

Boris got up and ran. Diana rolled to her feet and stared Batman down. She tossed out a flash pellet, and then took off after her target. Batman looked away as the pellet burst into a blinding aura of light, and ran after her.

Diana followed the trail from Boris's bloody nose, and tracked him to the missile silos. Boris stood above the one that they had just loaded the new missile into, a triumphant smile on his face. "You are too late. I have already set the missile to launch. I have completed my mission."

"Good for you." Diana said. "But I haven't completed mine."

Boris raised his gun just as Diana whipped her sword through the air. The blade sunk into the barrel of the gun as Boris pulled the trigger, and the weapon exploded in his hand. Boris let out a cry as his fingers were blow apart, and Diana took off toward him.

"**7 – 6 – 5" **An automated countdown announced. Diana moved to make the kill on Boris when Batman tackled her down.

"You just don't give up!" Diana shoved him off and flipped back up. **"3 – 2 –"**

"I – will not – be made a fool!" Boris screamed. He grabbed for his gun, and fired the entire clip down the missile silo.

**"Error! Error! Evacuate building immediately." **The automated voice warned.

Batman and Diana both widened their eyes, and broke into a sprint. Then there was a thundering explosion, and everything went black.

…

Batman's eyes came open slowly, his vision blurry at first. As it came into focus, he saw fire. Fire everywhere.

Then he saw the woman who he had been battling with all night. She was bloody, her arm looked like it might be broken, but she simply stared at him. The room burned around them as they sat in silence.

"I pulled us into Makarov's blast shelter." Diana said finally.

"Why?" Batman sat up slowly, curious as to why his life had been saved.

"My vendetta is not with you." She said simply. He stared into her eyes for a long moment.

Her eyes were blue like the ocean. But cold like it had frozen over. There was very little feeling left in her gaze, but behind the jaded walls of her eyes he saw pain. Anguish, agony and loss. He was able to find these traits in her eyes for one reason… they were exactly like his own.

She was beautiful. Breathtakingly so, and the dark knight wondered what had happened to fill her with so much hate. He remembered his own tragedy, and found himself wanting to understand hers. Because he understood her eyes, and he had a feeling he could understand her pain.

"Why are you doing this…?"

"The same reason you dress up like a bat every night. I'm avenging something."

"I don't kill people."

"Well that's your choice." Diana stood up and walked into the moonlight. "I saved your life. But I warn you… never interfere with my business again."

"Wait!" He struggled to get up behind her. "What did they do to you?"

"You really want to know?" Diana looked back at him. "Figure it out yourself detective."

And then she was gone, leaving Batman alone. He walked out into the cold night air, and fumbled until he found the communicator in his tattered, burned costume. "Alfred…" He spoke into the device. "You were right."


	4. War

**I think this might actually the longest I've ever taken to update anything, sorry for that everybody. Honestly, I've had almost no time to write at all recently, but I promise that an update will never take this long again. **

Chapter Four: The Enemy of My Enemy

"She saved my life." Bruce Wayne eyed the photograph on his computer. It was a security photo of Diana, taken from the base that she had destroyed only two nights before.

"She also killed over a dozen people." Clark Kent stated.

"Yes." Bruce leaned back in his chair. "But why?"

"Money, power, insanity, whatever." Clark shrugged.

"I don't think it's that simple. She's… she's avenging something."

"Did she tell you that?"

"Yes. But she didn't have to. I could recognize it in her eyes."

"Bruce…?" Clark raised an eyebrow. "You've never been the kind of person who-"

"Her eyes are the same as mine, Clark." Bruce cut him off. "I wouldn't expect you to understand. But for that moment when we locked eyes in that blast shelter… I could _feel _it. I could feel her pain… and it felt just like mine."

"So she's out for vengeance, a tragic villain maybe, it isn't the first one we've encountered."

"No. But she is the first who might actually have the right idea."

"Excuse me?"

"That man in charge of the facility she blew up? He was going to test Lord Industries' weaponry on a small village. He would have wiped out the population without a second thought. From what I picked up out the bits and pieces of conversation I heard… it wouldn't be the first time."

"The League has suspected for quite a while that Lord Industries may be involved in illegal activity. We've had Question checking up on it for months."

"Extortion and sabotage are one thing. But wiping out an entire village? That's genocide. This woman killing off the company's executives… she might just be the lesser of two evils here."

"That doesn't make killing people any less wrong, Bruce. You know that."

"Yeah." He continued staring at the photo. "Still… I'm curious." He leaned forward. "I have to find out what they did to her."

**Maxwell Lord's Office**

"I want this woman dead!" Maxwell Lord screamed, pointing to a picture on the monitor of Diana. "Why the _hell _is that so damn hard?"

"I don't know sir." His secretary said plainly.

"She's killed half my board members already, _and _now I have reporters and FBI riding my ass to find out what that military base out in Russia was for! That is _not _the image that I need to project while I'm running for Governor!" Maxwell kicked a wooden table so hard that it splintered into two pieces. "And on top of all that, now I have the Batman on my trail!"

"Unfortunate sir."

"You're damn right it's unfortunate. And that meddlesome bitch it going to die for it. I don't give a shit who I have to pay, she's going to die!"

Maxwell then spun away from the secretary, and pointed to a shadowed figure in the corner. "And you! You're supposed to be my protection! Where the hell are you now, huh?"

"Silence." The figure commanded, and a dangerous cold fell over the room. "I gave the location of Themyscira, I gave you the recourses to conquer the Amazons, and I gave you access to weaponry far beyond society's current advances. Have I not given you enough?" The figure took a step forward. "After all I've given you, you can't find the strength to kill _one _meddlesome woman by yourself? Perhaps I should invest my trust in another."

"We never expected this." Maxwell lowered his voice. "We never expected there to be a survivor."

"How do you want to deal with it, sir?" The secretary asked.

"We need to launch an offensive. We can't just sit back and let her pick us off one by one." Maxwell reasoned. "What assassins have worked for us before?"

"Mostly costumed ones." The secretary pulled up a list on her palm pilot. "Many are currently incarcerated."

"Well which ones do we have available, then?" Maxwell gritted his teeth.

"Deathstroke, Cheshire, and Deadshot."

"Hire all three of them. Whichever one kills this woman gets double the pay. And make sure it's untraceable, I don't want anyone finding out about this." Maxwell ordered.

"Yes sir." The secretary nodded. "And what about the Batman?"

"I will deal with him." The shadowed figure spoke in a low voice. "He sparks my interest."

"Alright then." Max Lord smiled, combed his hair, and prepared to head out to his big press conference. "All of our problems will soon be resolved."

**Metropolis Hotel – Four Hours Later**

Diana sat on the rickety fire escape ladder outside the small hotel room she had rented. She paid in cash, one night only. Just enough time to recover, then she would off again. She'd died her hair, red this time, and inserted green colored eye contacts. She had to be completely unrecognizable. Especially with Lord Industries having photos of her splashed all over the news.

Diana heard a knock on the door in her room, and with a sigh, climbed back in her window and went to answer. As she was crawling into the hotel room, however, she noticed an odd glint in her reflection on the window. A red dot.

Thinking quickly, Diana ducked to the floor just a moment before a bullet ripped into her hotel room. "Damn it." She growled, and rolled away from the window, careful to stay out of the sniper's vision.

The wooden door suddenly burst open, and a tall Chinese woman in a maid uniform stepped inside. "House keeping." The maid pulled the curtain off the cart she was pushing, revealing an assault rifle. Moving swiftly, the woman opened fire on Diana.

Equally fast, Diana dove into her bathroom, hearing bullets pound against the walls. She recognized the woman as Cheshire, a well known assassin.

Diana ducked for cover in the bathroom, and quickly ran over the information in her mind. The sniper had to be Deadshot, there was little questioning in that. Deadshot was shooting at her from an undetermined position, and Cheshire was in the apartment, closing in on her fast. Going over a list of options in her mind, Diana found that said options were severely limited.

Moving quickly, Diana pulled a large hunting knife out from underneath the sink, where she had hidden it. She leapt outward with all the speed she could muster, and plunged the blade at Cheshire.

The Asian woman dodged and slashed with her own dagger, gashing Diana across the stomach. Diana held in any reaction she may have had to the pain, and kept her eyes on the reflection in her own knife. As she had expected, she caught glimpse of a flash from behind her. Deadshot had fired another round!

Diana dove to the floor, confusing Cheshire. The female assassin realized what was happening just in time to fling her blade up and deflect the bullet, but the pure impact shattered her weapon.

Taking advantage of Cheshire's sudden vulnerability, Diana did a sweeping kick and took out the assassin's legs. Cheshire it the floor, and Diana rolled on top of her swiftly, knocking her out with a punch so powerful that it bloodied her own knuckles.

The Amazonian then left sprinted out the door and into the hallway, where she followed her first instinct and yanked down on the fire alarm. Instantly, alarms blared and people began evacuating their rooms in a panic. The frantic crowd would make it possible to escape the building without being taken out by Deadshot; she just had to blend in. She ran with the crowd down the stairs, but as she was reaching the door, she stopped in her tracks.

Diana felt a lump form in the pit of her stomach, because the men standing at the doorway, insisting that the people leave in an organized, single-file line, wore a Lord Industries logo on their jackets. "Damn it…" She growled, knowing that they would recognize her.

Then she heard fire fighters bursting into the building, trying to find what had set off the alarm. Diana looked down at the bleeding gash on her stomach, left by Cheshire's knife. It wasn't a terrible wound, but it would suffice. She quickly fell to the floor, and bit down hard on her tongue to make it seem as if she were coughing up blood.

A fireman quickly found her in the hallway, as she had hoped, and before Diana knew it she was being rushed onto a gurney and hauled into an ambulance. Not exactly a low-profile escape, but it would keep her out of sight of the Lord Industries' guards.

As the medics in the ambulance began to check Diana's wound, she heard an extremely loud noise, followed by the ambulance swerving violently. "What the hell?" One of the medics screamed, and suddenly they were rolling. Diana found herself crashing into the ceiling, which was now below her, with a painful thud. The doors to the ambulance flew open, and the thundering sound of rifle shots could be heard.

At the same moment, the heads of the two medics exploded in a burst of blood and brain matter. Diana crawled slowly onto the street, where the ambulance had crashed. A crowd of cars was now stopped around the seen, the drivers in shock.

She surveyed the seen quickly. The driver had been shot first, causing the vehicle to crash.

"That was pretty clever, faking your injury like that." A smooth, sophisticated voice said from behind her. "But not quite clever enough, I'm afraid."

Diana turned around slowly, and saw none other than Deathstroke the Terminator approaching her; he held a machete in one hand, and a high-caliber pistol in the other. She heard footsteps land behind her, and glanced back to see Deadshot, aiming his wrist-mounted guns at her head.

"We decided to take you out together, and split the reward 50/50." Deadshot grinned. "Although, considering _I _took out the ambulance… how about we make it 75/25?"

"About that…" Deathstroke moved quickly, and in an instant pumped a bullet into Deadshot's throat, dropping the sniper onto the asphalt. "I don't share."

"Let me guess… Maxwell Lord hired you?" Diana growled.

"And a few others, yes."

"Too bad… he wasted his money." Diana grabbed a shard of glass from the broken ambulance window and hurled it at Deathstroke, aiming at his throat with perfect precision. He slashed it out of the air with ease, but in a blur she moved to tackle him. Unfortunately, his reaction was faster than she had expected, and dodged around her strike.

"Unlike the others, I did my homework. For example, I know that blunt-force attacks have almost know effect on you," Deathstroke plunged his blade at the same moment Diana turned to strike him. "But piercing attacks? They have quite an effect on you."

Time froze. The only movement was the blood splashing onto the road beneath them. Deathstroke's machete had pierced Diana's midriff, and gone out her back.

"Unfortunately, I was supposed to bring you in alive…" Deathstroke whispered to the stunned woman. "Which is why I'll stop here." He injected a needle into her neck, and the fluid inside almost instantly knocked her out. "Hopefully an Amazon can recover from impalement. I guess we'll find out."

**Stryker's Island**

Lex Luthor sat quietly in his prison cell, eying his visitor curiously. "What brings you here to my humble abode, Batman?"

"I want answers." The dark knight demanded, staring Luthor down.

"You're going to have to be more specific."

"Lord Industries. I want to know everything that they _don't _want the public to know. All their secrets, their illegal activities… everything."

"And what on Earth makes you think I would know that, dark knight?" Luthor raised an eyebrow. "I do not, nor have I ever had, any affiliation with Lord Industries."

"Save it." Batman narrowed his gaze. "Lord Industries is LexCorp's biggest competitor in the technology department. You can't tell me that you didn't keep tabs on them. You must have kept an eye on what they were doing, to make sure your company stayed one step ahead. Am I right?"

"Perhaps." Luthor grinned. "So, assuming that I _do _have the answers you want, what's in it for me? Why should I help you?"

"I can bring them down. You give me the information I need, and I can take out your largest competitor."

"That does me absolutely no good if I'm rotting in a jail cell, now does it?" Luthor leaned forward.

"But it _does _do your company good. Do you know that Lord Industries is considering buying LexCorp?"

"Really? My company must have really taken a shit after I got locked up."

"Do you really want to see the company that you built taken over by your biggest competitor?" Batman reasoned. "You give me evidence against Maxwell Lord, and I will make sure he never makes another dime in his life."

"Well played, dark knight." Luthor grinned. "I suppose it can't do me any harm to tell you."

"Then get on with it."

"I had a spy on Maxwell Lord's board of directors. He got in pretty deep, learned every secret the company had."

"So what happened?"

"He got caught, and he was murdered and dumped in a ditch before he could ever report back to me. He stored all of the information he collected on his laptop, which is currently being stored in a heavily guarded Lord Industries warehouse. They didn't want to simply destroy it or delete the information, in case they would ever need the records later. I was never able to get my hands on the information. But if you managed to break into that warehouse and find the laptop, you could learn everything you want to know."

"You're sure?"

"That spy knew every illegal activity that company indulged in from day one." Luthor said assuredly. "Whatever it is you want to find, it'll be there, stored on that laptop."

"Good to know."

Then, as suddenly as he had appeared, Batman was gone. And he was now one step closer to finding out the truth.


	5. Pandora's Box

Chapter Five: Pandora's Box

Diana's eyes fluttered open slowly. Her vision was assaulted by a blur of color that slowly morphed into concise shapes, allowing her to make sense of her surroundings. The room was gloomy and gray, clearly a laboratory of some sort. Diana attempted to break free of the table she was strapped to, but was surprised to find the chains around her wrists and ankles could not be broken.

"And so the games begin." A suave, sophisticated voice fluttered into the room. A voice that Diana recognized all too well. Maxwell Lord. She looked up to see him approaching, wearing his usual business suit. He was accompanied by a bald man in a lab coat. "Care to tell me your name, darling?"

"Get bent."

"I was only asking to be polite. I thought you would rather be addressed by your name than as lab-bitch number one." Lord's gentle voice was suddenly filled with venom, penetrating Diana's solidarity with a razor edge.

"My name is Diana. Daughter of Hippolyta, Queen of the Amazons."

"Ah yes, the woman I killed." Lord paused, "She was the blonde one right? The one that screamed like a helpless child while I chopped her to pieces?"

Diana felt rage simmer in her chest, and she tried again to break free of the chains that bound her. Her struggles yielded no reward, and she remained trapped. "Those chains were borrowed from Themyscira while my men were bulldozing all of those temples. They were forged by Hephaestus, and not even Superman could break them. We tested."

"Why?" Diana uttered a low growl.

"Why _what_, Diana?"

"Why did you slaughter my people? Why did you and your mercenaries attack Themyscira and butcher the Amazons in cold blood? I want to know why."

"Its business, my dear. Do you have any idea how much money we've made off of your little Paradise Island? And as long as the public doesn't know how we came to posses it, we'll continue to make money."

"Capitalism? That's why you exterminated an entire race of people?"

"Well, there's that, _and _I was fulfilling my end of a business deal." Lord's billion-dollar smile faltered for a moment, as if he had just mentioned something that he didn't want to talk about. He quickly recovered his smug, superior grin however, and continued speaking. "It appears we weren't quite careful enough, though. After all, you got away. And you've caused quite a problem for my company. You killed half of my board members, and turned my respectable business into a media circus. Now I have journalists dogging my ass wondering why my board members specifically were targeted. Do you even know how much money I'll have to spend to cover up this mess you made?"

"Karma's a bitch."

"Yes, well." Lord ran his hand down Diana's cheek, sending shivers down her spine. "I'm going to make sure the profits compensate for the losses. I'm going to make a fortune off of you, Diana."

"How do you figure?"

"Listen to me carefully, Diana. Among mortals there is one, singular driving force that propels us to make accomplishments in our lifetime. And that force is death. Death is the monster we all fear, the one absolute truth we can never escape, because we know… we know that no matter what we accomplish, someday it won't matter. You become a celebrity, but one day you'll be dead and no one will remember your name. You can build a skyscraper, but one day it will fall and be replaced with something better. You can create a revolutionary technology and eventually it will obsolete. Nothing we do matters in the long run, Diana, because we die, and we're forgotten. Our achievements, our aspirations, our names… all of it is forgotten. But you… you don't have to worry about that, do you?"

Maxwell paced around the room frantically. "You Amazons were unrightfully gifted with immortality. You're young forever! You live as long as you damn well please! You don't have to worry about death because it doesn't apply to you. Who gave you the right? Who gave you that right to take death, the single greatest enemy to human design, and flaunt in our faces? You say I was wrong to wipe out your race, but how many lifetimes did they all live before then? I was only enforcing the laws of nature upon you unnatural, unworthy people who had chosen to defy those laws for far too long!"

Maxwell was practically seething with anger as his monologue continued. Finally, he calmed down and approached Diana again. "It isn't fair. What makes you so special, that you don't have to conform to the very rules that define the rest of us? When I destroyed Themyscira, I had the intention of ridding the world of you immortals. But over the years, I've learned to see things on a grander scale. I'm actually glad that you've survived all this time, Diana… because you're going to help me usher in a new revolution."

"Would you get to the point already?"

"It's simple, really. I'm going to determine what it is that makes you different. I'm going to have my doctors study you, and find out what allows you to stay young forever. And them I'm going to extract it… and I'm going to sell it. Thanks to you I am about to usher in a new era, Diana. Mortal men will grovel at the feet of Maxwell Lord, begging for a taste of the immortality I can offer! I refuse to settle for being the most powerful man in the world, Diana. I am going to become a god!"

"You're insane." Diana glared, her fists tightening. "You're nothing but a sick, deluded little boy who's afraid of his own mortality. It's pathetic."

"Sticks and stones, Diana. Sticks and stones."

"Does that mean I get to break your bones?"

Maxwell Lord walked casually up to Diana, and clenched her jaw in his hand tightly. "You think you're so damn powerful, but you don't know what true power really is. You don't deserve the gift you have. I deserve to live forever, Diana. And now I'm going to correct fate's mistake. I'm going to rewrite destiny, and become God. All because you held a grudge." Lord then struck Diana in the face, hard enough to draw blood. He hurt his hand in the process, but refused to show it.

"When I get lose…" Diana growled, "I'm going to break your fucking neck."

"As much as I would love to watch you wreath in agony, I have a press conference to attend. So I'm leaving you in the hands of Dr. Hamilton, here." Lord nodded to the man in the lab coat. "He's Lord Industries' top scientist. I'm sure you will enjoy each other's company."

Lord turned to Dr. Hamilton with a grin and said, "Don't worry about her comfort."

"Not an issue." Hamilton nodded.

Maxwell Lord left the room, off to his press conference, and Dr. Hamilton loomed over Diana with a surgical knife in hand. "Alright, Miss Diana… lets find out what makes your immortality tick."

**Warehouse X – Same Time**

Warehouse X was the high-security facility in which Lord Industries contained anything and everything it wanted to keep hidden from the public eye. It masqueraded as a simple storage building, but there was clearly more going on. After all, if it were really just a storage building, there wouldn't be guards at the front gate holding Ak47's.

Bruce Wayne had spent the day carefully studying blueprints of the facility, planning a way to get in. And now, night had fallen and Batman moved to execute his plan. Warehouse X stayed off the power grid by running off of its own Hydroelectric power. It was built near a river, and there was a small damn that produced the power used by the warehouse. There were underground tunnels that connected the inside of the dam to the inside of Warehouse X, in case maintenance needed to be done.

The bat-boat stealthily approached the exterior exit to one of these tunnels, on the side of the dam. Once within range, Batman snuck inside the tunnel and quickly continued forward.

Within minutes, he was in a basement underneath Warehouse X. Finding an air vent, Batman quickly pried off the grate and began crawling swiftly through the duct work. Using his memorization of the building schematic to carefully guide himself through the building, Batman reached his destination; the office of Harold Monroe, the chief of security at Warehouse X.

Monroe had a detailed list of where everything stored in the warehouse would be. Batman peered through the vent into the office, and saw Monroe filing paperwork at his desk. Needing a distraction, the dark knight pressed a detonation button on his utility belt, causing the bat-boat outside to self-destruct.

There was a thundering explosion from outside, shaking the windows of the entire facility. "What the hell?" Monroe jumped up from his seat, and immediately sprinted out of his office to see what was going on.

Once Monroe was gone, Batman kicked out the grate beneath him and dropped quietly into the office. He quickly found Monroe's PDA, and began searching for the location of the laptop. Unfortunately, there appeared to be no mention of it on the list. Batman checked, then double checked, and looked over all the files on the PDA one last time. There was no information as to the whereabouts of the laptop he needed.

"Luthor, if you lied to me…" Suddenly, the doorknob began to jiggle, and Batman immediately hid.

The door opened, and a young, scrawny boy in a security outfit ran into the office. He was muttering to himself, "Get the boss's phone get the boss's phone…"

As soon as he was within range, Batman leapt from behind the desk and clasped his hand tightly around the young guard's throat, ramming him against a wall! "I'm going to ask you a few questions, and if you lie to me, I will shatter every bone in your body. Understand?" Batman ordered, and the young man nodded frantically. "Is there a laptop in this building, confiscated from a corporate spy?"

"I don't know man! I'm new here! I was just supposed to come and get boss Monroe's cell phone, and then you grabbed me, and-"

"Focus! Laptop?"

"I have no idea. I didn't pay a whole lot of attention during the tour of the place. If you need to know where something is, check the boss's PDA."

"I did. It doesn't have the information I need."

"Then it must be a level ten…"

"Level ten? What does that mean?" Batman demanded.

"Level ten security. It's the highest level of classification an item in the warehouse can get. Level ten items aren't listed in the PDA."

"Then where can I find them?"

"All level ten's are kept locked up in the vault on the bottom floor. Only Monroe knows the password to open it. That's all I know man, I swear."

"You've been very educational." Batman knocked the young guard out, and quickly disappeared out the window.

**Bottom Floor – Twenty Minutes Later**

Harold Monroe paced back and fourth, staring at the six heavily armed guards before him. "Alright ladies, the Batman is here. We don't know why, and we don't know where. But we can verify that he is in this building. And if he had the balls to break into Warehouse X, I've got a gut feeling he'll eventually wind up here. The six of you are the final line of defense against this vault; not that he'd be able to get into it in the first place. You see the bat, you shoot the bat, and you kill the bat. No exceptions. Am I clearly understood?"

"Sir yes sir!" The six guards exclaimed in unison.

"Good. Patrol the room. At the slightest hint of any bat problems, I want you to light him up. Shoot first, don't bother asking questions. Go!"

The guards scattered throughout the room, which was filled with neatly organized shelves full of experimental weaponry. In the back of the room was the vault, standing in front of which was Monroe. The guards split up and searched the room thoroughly, looking for any sign of trouble.

Things were silent for several minutes and then, suddenly, one of the guard's shrieked in terror. A moment later, his unconscious body hit the concrete in the center of the room. "Batman's here!" A guard shouted.

"Find him, quick!" Another barked.

Suddenly, a bat-claw launched from the shadows and grabbed a lone guard, pulling him into the darkness. There was a loud crack, and he too hit the floor unconscious. The guards shined their lights on the area, but there was no sign of Batman. "Damn it! He's taken down two of us already!"

"Where the hell is he?"

"Split into groups of two, find him and pump lead in his ass."

"Sounds good to me!"

The remaining four guards split off into twos. One pair walked diligently side by side between two shelves of weaponry. Suddenly, Batman dropped down from the ceiling and landed behind them. Immediately, he reached out and bashed their heads together. They two hit the floor, incapacitated.

A smoke pellet hit the floor between the last two guards, blinding them, and immediately Batman soared in and dispatched of them. Monroe, now alone, opened fire on the cloud of smoke with his pistol. But by the time the smoke cleared, Batman was gone.

"I'll kill you, you son of a bitch!" Monroe growled, firing off blindly around the room, hoping to hit his mark. The moment Monroe ran out of bullets, Batman appeared behind him. The dark knight grabbed a surprised Monroe and bashed his head into the steel door of the vault!

"What's the password? Talk!"

"As if I'd tell you anything." Monroe replied, his face pressed firmly against the vault door.

"How badly do I need to hurt you before you change your mind?"

"Nothing you can do to me even compares to what Lord will do. You'll get nothing out of me."

"Want to bet?" Batman looked Monroe in the eyes. "I can be _very _persuasive."

**Ten Minutes Later**

"Ok! Ok!" Monroe screamed, dropping to the floor in a terrified, quivering heap. "I'll tell you everything! Just leave me alone!"

"Password. Tell me." Batman ordered.

"The password is Pandora's Box."

"Pandora's Box?"

"Lord picks the passwords; I don't know what it means!"

"Thank you for your cooperation." Batman stomped on Monroe's head, putting him out like a light.

The dark knight approached the vault and typed **Pandora's Box **into the keypad. There was the loud, metallic click of the door coming unlocked, and Batman was able to pull it open with minor effort. The inside contained about a dozen items. Batman only paid attention to one. A laptop, sitting on a shelf labeled **Level Ten Classification.**

Batman quickly plugged a modified flash drive into the USB port of the lap top, and it instantly copied all of the files. Batman returned the flash drive to his utility belt, and smashed the laptop. "Now to return home… and find out what you've been hiding, Maxwell Lord."

**Maxwell Lord's Office – Two Hours Later**

Harold Monroe had been brought to Maxwell Lord's office as soon as Lord learned of Batman infiltrating Warehouse X. Lord paced angrily back and forth throughout the office, seething with anger. "What I want to know is this… how does one man, _one man_, manage to outwit an entire team of highly trained security professionals, armed with top of the line equipment?"

"It was inhuman, sir. I can't even describe how easily he defeated my men. I'm ashamed to say that I was no exception."

"What did he take?"

"Sir…"

"What did he take?" Lord repeated, a greater edge in his tone this time.

"I'm not certain. I checked the vault, and everything appeared to be in order. Except-"

"Except what?"

"There was a laptop. It had been destroyed."

Maxwell Lord paused a moment. "The laptop… well that's just great. Now he knows everything!"

"I apologize for my incompetence sir." Monroe said politely, "Next time I will make a greater effort to-"

"Oh shut up!" Without hesitation, Lord swung his diamond wine glass and smashed it against Monroe's temple. Blood splattered onto Monroe's face, and he died on the floor of Maxwell's office.

"Janice!" Lord yelled to his secretary, "Put out an ad for a new chief of warehouse security. Preferably one who actually knows how to do his job this time!"

"Anything else sir?"

"Well, I should probably have this body disposed of, as if that weren't obvious you stupid bitch!" Lord screamed, glaring at his secretary with murder in his eyes.

Suddenly, a cold, raspy voice pierced into the room. "What exactly do you suppose we do about this, Maxwell?"

Maxwell turned to see a man, his face hidden in shadows, standing in the corner of the office. "Obviously we'll have to kill the Batman." Lord said, pouring himself another glass of wine.

"You say that as if it is an easy task." The shadow man hissed.

"I had the Amazon captured by hiring assassins. I'll do the same with the bat. I'll get Deathstroke right on it and-"

"No!" Snapped the shrouded figure. "Your methods have already been used against the Batman once, yielding no success." The figure motioned toward Monroe's dead body on the floor to emphasize his point.

"Then what do you propose?" Lord demanded.

"Watch your tone with me, Maxwell." The figure said dangerously. "I'm the one who _put _you on top. And I can just as easily make you nothing again."

"Sorry." Lord muttered, backing off a little. "How do you suggest we take care of Batman?"

"You focus your resources on the Amazon. I will take care of Batman personally." The figure explained. And then, just as suddenly as he had appeared, he was gone.

Two men entered the room to dispose of Monroe's body, and Maxwell Lord stared out his office window. _"Watch your tone with me, Maxwell." _He mimicked angrily, taking another gulp of his wine. "If you only knew what I _really _had planned, you arrogant bastard… you'd be the one watching your tone."


	6. Revealed

**As most of you have probably guessed, this story, and all my others, have been on hiatus for quite some time. I apologize sincerely for the delays, and assure you that I did not take this hiatus without good reason. I doubt any of you want to sit and read me whining about my personal life, so to make a long story short, I've been dealing with severe illness, death in the family, financial troubles, moving and trying to keep up with schoolwork on top of it all. In the midst of everything, there was just no time or motivation to write. But the good news is, things are finally looking up now, and I'm ready to make my return. I hope that you will all continue reading this story, and I will resume frequent updates from here on out.**

Chapter Six: Revealed

"Amazons," Batman spoke the word aloud, while his mind performed a detailed analysis. He had gone over the information found on the laptop from Luthor's spy a dozen times. During his tenure in the Justice League, Batman had taken on alien conquerors, demons, monsters and 5th-deminsoinal imps. So all things considered, a race of warrior women residing on a paradisiacal island, shielded from man's detection by the power of Greek gods, should not have seemed too far-fetched. He came to accept the idea as reality after only a few moments of contemplation, and was then able to continue onto more pertinent matters. Lord Industries' involvement.

According the files, while Lord Industries was still making electric pencil sharpeners and pedometers, Maxwell was assembling his own private army of mercenaries. He then deployed this army to Themyscira, and using cutting edge modern weaponry, was able to overpower them. He exterminated all of the Amazons within just a few hours. And then he used their island as the center for his meteoric rise to power. It wasn't long after that Lord Industries, previously on the verge of bankruptcy, was suddenly competing with WayneTech and LexCorp. They mined a nearly indestructible ore from underneath the temple of Hephaestus, a metal alloy which man's world had never seen before. Lord Industries was soon selling it as body armor to militaries around the world. Their advances only continued from there.

It explained everything. Diana must have been the only survivor from Themyscira. The last Amazon. It made perfect sense that she was now out for blood against Lord; she had likely witnessed her entire people slaughtered by his hand. She was left with a deep hatred for Maxwell Lord at an early age. A hatred that festered within her all throughout her life, motivating her training, and fueling her vendetta.

Only one piece of the puzzle remained; how did Maxwell Lord find Themyscira? That was the only question for which Bruce had no answer. Themyscira had remained shielded from man's detection for centuries. Lord's company was nearing bankruptcy then; his army was funded entirely by money drawn from his inheritance. How did a rich but failing business man happen to just stumble upon Themyscira, and decide to commit genocide? It made no sense.

And it would have to wait, because the bat signal was now illuminating the Gotham skyline…

**Gotham Central Bank **

The robbers moved quickly, unscrewing the bolts on the bank vault with expert precision. They dropped the door and began to loot from the money inside. Meanwhile, two men stood at the door armed with submachine guns, waiting for any sign of trouble. There were six of them all together.

Batman took quick note of all this from his perch on a nearby building, and planned out his course of action. Once his strategy was set, Batman leapt from the gargoyle and spread his cape, gliding down on top of the bank. He crashed in through the skylight and planted his feet on the shoulders of one of the robbers, forceful enough to dislocate both his arms. Before the thugs could even react, Batman hurled a series of smoke pellets downward, shrouding the room in an impenetrable haze of smog.

However, Batman quickly realized that something was amiss. His sudden entry should have thrown the criminals into a panicked frenzy, but they hardly even reacted. It was as if his arrival had been utterly mundane to them, and did not even warrant a reaction. More disturbing still, the criminals beneath Batman's feet suddenly morphed into a serpent of some sort, and slithered away.

Now it was apparent that Batman had walked directly into a trap. He readied a baterang and prepared to move. But as the smoke cleared away, he saw all six of the robbers, standing a neatly organized line. Their eyes shone with a bright, fluorescent yellow. They spoke in unison, "You should not have interfered in the affairs of Maxwell Lord. Your insolence will now be rewarded with death."

The six robbers began to blend together, morphing into one another. Batman remained calm, despite his growing sense of shock. Within moments, a new figure towered before him; a reptilian creature, startlingly large, with a pair of wings and six long, serpentine heads. "That was… unexpected," Batman frowned. One of the heads lunged at him, teeth gnashing. Batman quickly summersaulted out of the way, but two more heads were already coming for him. He kicked one in the nose, drawing a fountain of blood. The second he dodged, and slashed its eye with the baterang he held in hand, drawing a guttural screech from the monster.

Suddenly, the middle head reared up and roared, unleashing a torrent of fire. Batman quickly rolled behind a large granite pillar. The fire struck the pillar, and began to arc around the obstacle, surrounding Batman in a swath of unbearable heat. Batman could already feel the pillar starting to give way. He pulled a grapple gun from his utility belt, aimed it at the chandelier hanging from the ceiling, and fired. He hooked the chandelier and pulled himself up from the blaze just as the pillar crumbled, and flame engulfed the spot where the dark knight had been just a moment before.

Batman flipped onto to top of the large crystalline chandelier. A serpentine head flung itself up at him, but grabbed the chain holding the chandelier and jerked back on it, causing the fixture to swing and strike the head directly in the jaw, shattering several teeth. Once he was positioned, Batman used the spikes on his gauntlet to slash the chain, separating the massive chandelier from the ceiling. The chandelier plummeted through the air, and Batman shifted his weight upon it to keep it aimed at his mark. He struck with expert precision, ramming the pointed base of the crystal chandelier directly in the middle head of the beast.

The pure force separated the head from its neck, leaving nothing but a bloody stump, which doused the room in the coppery crimson fluid. All five of the monster's remaining heads shrieked, writhing in agony. And then something highly unexpected happened. The limp, stumpy neck of the severed head began to ripple, and suddenly, it divided into two separate heads!

Batman scowled, suddenly aware of what he was fighting. The Hydra of Greek mythology. When one head is severed, two more grow back. The beast lashed out at Batman, attacking with the ferocity of a rabid animal. Batman did his best to evade the onslaught of the seven-headed beast, but it was fast, and one of the heads manage to lock its teeth into his arm.

Batman let out a cry of pain as blood soaked through his suit. Had it not been for his the protection of his armor, the bite would have ripped his arm off at the shoulder. The Hydra did not let go, instead dragging Batman violently across the floor, toward the gaping maws of the other six heads. As Batman's bleeding body was pulled across the tiled floors of the bank, he used his free hand to fumble around in his utility belt. He withdrew a batarangs and began stabbing the monster's face repeatedly with it, drawing spurts of blood. After rending the creature's facial tissue is several places, the Hydra finally let go of Batman's arm. He flipped onto his feet just in time to be struck down by a head-butt from another head.

A middle head came in to consume the dark knight. He withdrew his miniature Bat-grenade, and threw it immediately into the creature's open mouth. It detonated, blowing the monster's jaw apart. Chunks of tongue and bits of shattered tooth rained down on Batman, who shambled to his feet and took cover behind another pillar, one that was still standing. Thinking quickly, Batman attached a small C4 explosive from his belt to the pillar, and then stealthily took cover behind a desk. A hydra head peered around to search for Batman behind the pillar. He pressed his remote control and detonated the C4, blasting the pillar off of its support. The pillar came tumbling down, and crushed the neck of the Hydra, pinning one head down without severing it.

The creature wailed, trapped beneath the heavy granite, and the remaining six heads were thrown into a panic. Batman took advantage of this and broke into a sprint, catapulting himself off of the pinned down Hydra head, and glided into the air. A head lunged at him, but it was the one that he had blown the jaw off of. It found itself unable to bite, and he easily evaded it. A second head spotted him, and lunged as well. This one did have teeth.

Batman arched himself downward to pick up speed in his glide, and sailed toward one of the four remaining pillars. He swerved out of the way at the last moment, and the Hydra head forcefully collided with it, shattering the pillar and the Hydra's skull simultaneously. Batman knew that the pillars were only decorative, and did not really support the ceiling. It was safe to use them as a battlefield advantage. The impact had reduced the brain of that Hydra head to jelly, and it fell limp on the floor. Now there were five Hydra heads left active, and only four were equipped for combat, since one of them was missing a face.

The creature's movement was also hindered now, with one head trapped underneath a marble pillar, and another limp and lifeless. Three pillars were left standing. Once they were gone, the battlefield would be completely open, and Batman would be at a severe disadvantage. He analyzed all of this quickly and efficiently in his mind, trying to formulate and effective battle strategy before he was attacked again.

They were getting smarter as well. Two Hydra heads lunged at Batman from the front, while two more slithered around behind him. Batman withdrew a bolo from his utility belt, ducked out of the way of an incoming Hydra bite, and flung the bolo with expert precision. It tied two of the Hydra's necks together tightly, causing two of the heads to ram together. While those two heads were disoriented, Batman turned his attention to the two trying to sneak up on him.

Batman threw down a flash pellet to blind the creature, and then retreated behind one of the remaining three pillars. There, he remembered the Greek myth in which Hercules defeated by Hydra by burning its neck with a torch every time he severed a head, which prevented it from growing more. Batman withdrew a pack of thermite from his utility belt. He only had enough thermite for one shot; he would have to make it count.

Batman aimed his grapple gun at the jaw of one Hydra head, which was sniffing the air tentatively for him. He fired, and hooked the Hydra. The beast shrieked and jerked Batman off the ground, hurling him into the air. Batman positioned himself quickly, and pressed the button on the grapple gun which caused the line to reel in. Batman zipped down on the line, straight toward the panicked Hydra head. Once within range, he flipped and kicked the creature in the throat.

Batman used the force of his kick to launch himself downward, allowing the grapple to release line again, and glided directly into the most enclosed space available; the open bank vault. Batman rolled into the vault and reeled in the grapple line again, forcing the Hydra to follow him. All of the Hydra's remaining heads chased Batman, wriggling ferociously into the vault. With the Hydra's in, Batman had literally two inches of space to move inside of the rather small vault. _Perfect_.

He laid out the thermite, ignited the magnesium ribbon, and witnessed the chemical reactions take place instantly. The thermite erupted into a blaze of heat. Batman shrouded himself in his cape, and listened to the enclosed Hydra's shriek. _Thermite burns at about 2500 degrees Celsius, hot enough to melt most metals rather quickly. It should do the trick for cauterizing a couple of Hydra heads, _Batman thought.

The raging chemical fire within the bank vault incinerated the Hydra's heads, and scorched everything left. It wasn't long before it was burning through Batman's cape. Holes began to form in his suit. Moving quickly in the unbearable heat, Batman ripped off the vent in the back of the vault and climbed into the air ducts. He down from a vent outside the vault, and watched the fire finally begin to die down. The Hydra was dead, and already its body was starting to disappear.

Batman's suit was torn, scorched and bloody. He clutched his wounded arm, from where the Hydra bit him, and began to make his escape before the GCPD arrived. Once he was a safe distance away, he made a call.

_"What is it Bruce?" _The Oracle answered her communicator.

"I was just attacked by the Hydra. As in, the Greek mythology Hydra."

_"What?"_

"I want you to run a thorough background check on everyone who Maxwell Lord is known to have had contact with over the last thirty years."

_"That's a tall order Bruce."_

"I know. Can you do it?"

_"I'm insulted that you even had to ask. I'll call you in the morning and tell you what I find. But… can I have some idea of what I'm looking for?"_

"I wish I knew."

**Lord Towers – One Hour Later**

"Well how the mighty have fallen," Maxwell Lord smiled.

"The Batman proved more resourceful than I anticipated," replied the figure standing in the corner of Lord's office, veiled in shadows.

"The point remains that now both of us have failed to kill the Batman on our first attempt," scowled Lord. "If we don't put a stop to this flying rodent soon, he's going to bring everything crashing down! He knows about the Amazons now, it's only a matter of time before he digs up the proof to tie me to their extinction."

"He will not find evidence that does not exist," replied the figure. "I personally saw to it that any traces of that operation were wiped clean from the Earth."

"Just like you were going to 'personally see to it' that Batman was killed?" Lord retorted.

"Do not test me, Maxwell. It is because of me that you possess any power at all, and I can strip it from you just as easily."

"We cannot allow the Justice League's interference in our affairs to continue, Ares!" Lord snapped. It was the first time that he had addressed Ares by name in years. "The Batman will be weary after his fight with the Hydra. I'll deploy my assassins, and you can do whatever the hell you want. I'm putting an end to this. We're too far along now to be having some pointed eared bastard throwing a monkey wrench in the plan."

"Very well," Ares finally stepped out of the shadows, revealing himself to be a tall man in elaborate black armor. "If you ever raise your voice to me again, Maxwell, I will impale you on a stake and leave the birds to feast on your organs."

With that, Ares vanished. Lord removed his private cell phone from his pocket, and made a call. "Deathstroke? It's Lord. I require your services."

**Basement Level**

_Hera, give me strength. _Diana hadn't prayed since she was eight. But she hadn't felt weak since then, either. She had long since given up trying to break free of the cuffs which held her to the operating table. Dr. Hamilton had been cruel with his experiments on her, trying to find the source of her immortality. Day after day, Lord had visited her to recite his speech about how the Amazons were an abomination to the world, and how they had no right to live forever when humankind had to face death at every turn. Lord was so passionate about his cause that Diana sometimes began to agree with him. And then he would snap, and remind her of his insanity. Of his tendency toward violence.

Lord was abusive. He took every chance he had to hurt her, and it was infuriating that she could do nothing to stop him. She didn't know how many days it had been now, strapped to the table with nothing but her own thoughts for companionship, enduring the cruel and painful experimentation of Dr. Hamilton, and the psychopathic ramblings of Maxwell Lord. And though she stubbornly refused to accept it, her will was almost broken.

"Well isn't this interesting," Hamilton's dry, fatherly voice echoed from within the darkness. "It appears that your immortality may not be primarily internal, my dear. It seems as if your body is drawing energy from some alternative source, energy that seems to halt aging. Fascinating."

"Thanks for the update pinprick," Diana growled.

"Smile, my dear. I'm one step closer to learning how to replicate your gift of immortality." Hamilton ran his hand smoothly down Diana's cheek. It shook with lust. Diana had caught on rather early that in addition to being a sadist, Hamilton was also a bit of a pervert. "Do you know what that means, darling? It means that pretty soon, you'll be free of all this suffering."

"I know you aren't going to let me free," Diana spat, refusing to fall into his mind games.

"Oh no, of course not dear. Once I'm done, we're going to kill you."


	7. The Enemy of My Enemy

Chapter Seven: The Enemy of My Enemy…

Batman approached the Council of Seven tentatively. The original seven members of the Justice League; Superman, The Flash, Green Lantern, Martian Manhunter, Aquaman, Big Barda and himself, composed the council. Batman stood before his longtime allies, and began to speak. "I've called this meeting to discuss a recent turn of events. I have uncovered the identity and motives of the female assassin who has been killing off Lord Industries employees."

"You mean the same one who made a fool of us a few weeks ago?" Flash piped in, "I'm interested."

"She did _not _make a fool of me," Barda snapped, "I was caught off guard. I did not expect her to possess superhuman attributes."

"None of us did, especially not on the level that she displayed," Superman added, "But just because we have an idea of what she's capable of now, Barda, doesn't mean that she isn't dangerous. Whatever Batman has uncovered, I'm sure it will prove vital in our efforts to bring her down."

Batman paused a moment to make sure that the discussion was over. When the silence confirmed this, he continued. The dark knight moved to the large supercomputer on the far end of the room, and pulled up his files on the case, displaying an image of the assassin on the monitor, taken by street cameras. She was escaping the vehicle which she had driven off of the overpass and smashed into her target's car to kill him. In the photo, her dark hair was an untamed mess due to the crash, she was covered in ash from the explosion, and blood from her target had splattered her face. Batman was somewhat disturbed to find that she still looked beautiful.

"I don't know her name at this point," Batman began, "So for the time being, I have opted to call her Nemesis."

"Nemesis?" Green Lantern raised an eyebrow.

"The Greek goddess of revenge," Batman explained. "It's more fitting than you might think."

"How so?" Superman questioned.

"This woman is an Amazon."

Batman's fellow Leaguers stared at him quizzically. "As in… the rain forest?" Flash questioned.

"No. The Amazons were a race of warrior women blessed by Hera, and given the remote island isolated from man's world known as Themyscira to live on, separated from man's world for all of eternity."

"That does not make sense," Aquaman chimed. "I've scoured the seven seas in their entirety. If there were some mystical, undiscovered island, wouldn't we know about it by now?"

"We do. Because it isn't undiscovered anymore. For the last thirty years… it has been known as Paradise Island, the business center and luxury hotel of Lord Industries."

"Did Maxwell Lord just buy the island from an ancient race of warrior women, then?" Barda asked.

"No, he stole it from them," Batman changed the image on the screen. This time, it was an image of the security footage from Maxwell Lord's office building… time stamped at December 4th, 3:04 p.m., 1982. The picture showed a tall, blond haired man in a dark suit, carrying a briefcase and a winning smile, entering the building. "That man is Tom Sera. He was the owner of a shady security organization called A.R.E.S."

"The League has investigated A.R.E.S. before," Superman stated. "They present themselves as a legitimated security company, but there is evidence suggesting that they hire themselves out as mercenaries."

"Thirty years ago, A.R.E.S. founder and CEO Tom Sera approached Maxwell Lord in his office building, back when Lord Industries was still making tissue boxes and electric pencil sharpeners. I'm not sure how yet… but somehow they knew about Themyscira and its location. Lord made a deal with A.R.E.S., armed their mercenaries with high-end tech, and attacked Themyscira… killing all of its inhabitants. Except for one."

"And that's our assassin," Superman gave an understanding nod.

"Yes. This woman somehow survived the attack the attack on Themyscira. She is the last living Amazon. And now, she's seeking revenge on the one's responsible."

"But what was the motive? Why would Maxwell Lord and Tom Sera want to attack Themyscira?"

"I'm not sure," Batman replied, "But maybe we shouldn't be looking for Tom Sera's motivations."

"Why is that?"

"Because the man in this picture is not the _real _Tom Sera."

"What…?" Superman paused, "How do you figure that?"

"That same day, Tom Sera died. An aneurism on his aortic valve burst, and he died in minutes."

"You suspect foul play?" Green Lantern asked.

"No. I brought up the medical records and checked over them thoroughly… there's no reason to believe that his death was not of natural cause. Here's the problem; all evidence suggests that Tom Sera died in his sleep, early that morning. Forensic specialists put his time of death around 4:00 a.m. This photograph is time stamped at 3:04 p.m., that same day."

"Tom Sera was already dead when this picture was taken!" Flash realized.

"Exactly," Batman nodded. "Tom Sera had been dead for eleven hours before he supposedly visited Maxwell Lord that day. Meaning that whoever this person is… whoever signed A.R.E.S. mercenaries out to Lord, to attack Themyscira… it was not the _real _Tom Sera."

"So whoever this imposter is… they approached Maxwell Lord with an army, and offered him the chance to commit genocide, just so that Lord could build a few buildings on a previously undiscovered island?" Superman frowned, "Something about this just doesn't add up."

"There's something more to it than that. After The Amazons were massacred and Themyscira was turned into Lord's business center, Lord Industries skyrocketed. Before they Amazons were wiped out, Lord Industries could barely pay its bills. Then, all of the sudden, it's a massive world-wide weapons retailer that competes with Wayne Enterprises and LexCorp? Whoever this man who impersonated Tom Sera was… they had a lot of power to offer. The power to make Maxwell Lord a god."

…

Diana had finally been released from her shackles, only to have her hands restricted by cuffs forged from the same indestructible iron taken from Hephaestus' temple. A man prodded her to move forward, and it took all of her restraint not to kick his jaw off. _Lord will have a whole security team armed and waiting if I act up_, she thought, _Best to keep it under control._

The man led Diana into a conference room of sorts, in which Maxwell Lord awaited with his usual suave and egotistical smile. "Good morning dear," Lord's debonair voice called, teeming with sophistication. Each word that Lord spoke was meticulously paced in an even tone. "Dr. Hamilton has a little presentation for us this morning, I think you'll find it rather interesting. He's finally cracked the immortality nut, you see. All of those experiments on you led up to this discovery. Speaking of experimentation, I see that your scars have almost healed up already… what a luxury it must be, to have the abilities you possess… and luxury that you and your kind selfishly horde away from those deserving of it. That's the point of all this, you see… to rectify nature's error, and-"

"And give the gift of immortality to anyone willing to buy it, I know. You give me that tired old speech every damn day."

"Mouth one isn't she?" Lord grinned, looking over to a man in the corner who Diana had not noticed before.

The man's form was shrouded in darkness, but his very presence sent a chill down Diana's spine which she could not quite explain. "So was her mother…" the man said, his voice a guttural rasp, but strangely rhythmic, melodic even… like honey and knives.

"What do you know about my mother?" Diana growled.

"Quite a bit, actually. But notas much as I know about you… _sister_."

"What are you talking about…? Who are you?"

"I've gone by many names over the years. Mars, the Warbringer, the Treacherous Son… I was even called Tom Sera for a time. But you would know me best as… Ares."

Diana felt a heavy lump form in her stomach. She glared at Ares' shadowed form, then at the smiling Maxwell Lord, and back again. "You… you were behind it all… that's how Lord knew about Themyscira and where to find it… it as _you_!"

"Clever girl," Ares cooed. "You certainly didn't get that from our father, the old fool."

"Son of a bitch!" Diana grit her teeth, "_Why_? Why did you help Lord...?"

"Actually, Lord helped me," Ares chuckled. "I'd been wanting to get rid the Amazons for quite some time… they were constantly interfering with my work, preaching all their 'peace is the answer' bullshit. Then, during my travels, I encountered Maxwell Lord, he was the head of a quaint little company that was about to go bankrupt. I could see in his eyes that Maxwell had potential… a burning, fiery hatred for the world, fueled by his motivation to live forever. I knew that I could use that. But I needed a smart way to approach him… a way to ensure the job got done. Then I found out about a fitting little company called A.R.E.S., a _'security' _company that hired out mercenaries to the highest bidder. They were owned by Tom Sera, a despicable creature he was… I created a little aneurism on his aortic valve. It wouldn't have surprised anyone that he had it… fat fucker ate fast food for every meal. I let nature take its course, and Tom Sera died in his sleep of natural causes, leaving no reason for the police to investigate anything. Once the _real _Tom Sera was out of the way, I took his form for just a little while, before his death was officially announced… and I approached Maxwell Lord in his office, arguing with a tax collector. I offered him power. Limitless power, beyond what he could ever imagine… all he had to do in return was buy out A.R.E.S., equip their mercenaries with weaponry and march them onto Themyscira. He did his job perfectly. He wiped the Amazons out of existence… except for _one_. You."

"Then why are you still here?" Diana demanded, "If Lord already completed his end of the deal, what are you still doing here?"

"Because I underestimated Lord's aspirations, you see," Ares smiled. "After his company took off and became a major success, with a little help from me of course, Lord approached me again. And he said he had an idea… you see, he realized that if he hadn't killed the Amazons, they all would have lived forever. And that intrigued him. He explained his little idea to me; we find a way to replicate that immortality, and incorporate it into regular people. But for a price. Not only would Lord gain eternal life and a massive profit, but I would get the war to end all wars."

"What do you mean?"

"Wars have been fought over much less, Diana. The humans, they've spent centuries killing each other over land, money, religion, whatever stupid little thing that they can use as an excuse to blow one another up. Humans will go to war over any small little division between themselves… imagine what something like the chance at eternal life would bring about! Everyone would take up arms in a hopeless effort to escape their own mortality. You see, not _everyone _can live forever, Diana. There will be a limited supply of chances at eternal life… and the people of this Earth will all go mad fighting for it."

"You're planning to start World War III… and Lord gets eternal life and a massive payout in return for helping you!"

"Have you _seen _the news, Diana?" Ares laughed. "I don't have to _start _anything. They'll do it themselves in a few years. All we're doing is creating the supply and the demand… the catalyst that will kick start the inevitable."

"For a long time, it appeared that achieving immortality for the common man was impossible," Maxwell Lord chimed in. "Ares and I were almost ready to give up on our search. I'd hired all of the best scientists in the industry, and Ares supplied them with Olympian tech, and still… _nothing_. We were nearly out of options… when _you _showed up, and started killing off my employees in your little quest for revenge. I bet you thought that by murdering Lord Industries board members, you were throwing a monkey wrench in my plans," Lord smiled, "But the truth is, dear, you supplied the very thing we needed to move the plan forward. Up until you started making your presence known, we had no idea an Amazon had survived the attack. Once we had you… we could harness your immortality, figure out how it worked from a live test subject. You helped us meet our goals, Diana."

Ares approached Diana, finally revealing himself in the light. His body was covered in a black armor, stained with the blood of countless fallen adversaries. But from within the helmet, his fiery eyes burned, like demonic torches held within the facemask. "This plan of ours comes in three phases. Phase One was killing the Amazons. Phase Two is harnessing your immortality and selling it to the masses, thus jump starting the war."

"What's Phase 3?" Diana demanded, and Ares laughed.

"Phase 3 is the real kicker. I _feed_ off of war, you see. The more violence and bloodshed there is plaguing humanity, the more powerful I become. When we launch World War III, I'll become more powerful than I've ever been! I'll be strong enough to overthrow our father, and take control of Olympus… claiming my rightful place as King of the Gods!"

"Why do you keep saying that, _our _father? What the hell do you mean?" Diana stared at Ares fiercely, her warrior blood boiling. Just being near Ares drew out a powerful rage within her, a lust for battle. It took every ounce of her willpower to keep herself under control.

"You mean mommy dearest never told you?" Ares chuckled. "Why do you think you're so much stronger than the other Amazons were? Why do you think that they put such a high priority on saving _your _life, above all others on Themyscira?" Ares ran his hand down Diana's cheek. "Diana… you're a demigod. And your father is Zeus."

…

Batman soared over the streets of Gotham, his cape spread, gliding through the air. Sirens blared in the distance, but the dark knight was too enraptured by his thoughts to even notice them. He could not stop thinking about the woman… the assassin who he had dubbed Nemesis… the one who had saved his life. _Her mission is the same as mine, _Batman thought, _Vengeance. Retribution. Justice for the death of her family… she watched it happen, she watched her loved ones be shot down in cold blood… sounds familiar. She was just eight years old. Déjà vu._

Batman landed atop a gargoyle protruding off of the Old Gotham Church. _I know I have to bring her down, _he thought, _but why don't I want to?_

Out of nowhere, an ear-splitting screech filled the air. Batman was rocked from his contemplation just in time to register a huge, leathery skinned creature sailing toward him. Batman had no time to react before a set of talons penetrated his armor, rending the flesh of his shoulders. Batman let out a pained cry as the creature lifted him from the gargoyle and prepared to drop him onto the streets below.

Batman quickly reached for his utility belt, withdrew a tazer, and jammed it into the ankle of the creature holding him. The creature let out another screech, this one in pain, and flung Batman from its grasp. Batman twisted in the air and extended his cape, dipping into a fast glide.

The creature soared after him, barreling downwards and shrieking into the night. Batman flung himself around, spinning in the air to face the creature as it descended toward him, and hurled a batarang into its row of razor sharp teeth. There was a fierce clash as the batarang collided with the monster's gaping maw, and suddenly exploded into a cloud of smoke, simultaneously blinding and suffocating the creature. Batman turned and veered up, holding his cape like a parachute to slow his descent.

The creature barreled down past him, spiraling as it haphazardly tried to escape the smoke. Once it was beneath him, Batman rotated into a dive-bomb position and tackled the creature in midair. Once he had ahold of it, Batman fired his grappled gun onto a nearby billboard, and began to retract it, pulling the creature with him.

Batman reeled the disoriented flying monster straight into the concrete ledge of the building, as he himself flipped safely onto the top of the billboard. The creature collided violently, tumbling across the rooftop and leaving a streak of blood behind it.

The monster then lay on the ground, twitching, a barely audible growl escaping its throat. Batman was now able to finally get a good look at the creature. It was female, with a large wingspan and sharp talons, but an otherwise very feminine form, complete with a face that looked frighteningly human.

"It's called a Harpy," a voice called from behind, "And there are two more where she came from."

Batman turned to see none other than Deathstroke the Terminator. The assassin stepped out of the shadows, wielding his machete confidently. "That's the second one of Ares' monsters you've killed now, Batman. He isn't going to be very happy about that."

"What do you have to do with this, Slade?" Batman demanded. "Supernatural affairs aren't usually your forte."

"Whatever pays the bills," Deathstroke shrugged.

Batman reached for his utility belt, but found that he was suddenly moving with an unusual sluggishness. His body felt heavy, and his vision began to blur.

"Feeling a little off kilter?" Deathstroke taunted, "You're experiencing the early stages of paralysis, soon followed by nausea, vomiting, tingling around the mouth and heavy salivation. You'll soon lose consciousness, and then fall victim a respiratory failure which will lead to death. Those are symptoms of Hydra poisoning… remember the Hydra, that creature you killed not long ago? You may not know that the Hydra's blood is toxic to humans. So, after you killed it, and a certain someone gave me a call asking me to kill you… I collected the Hydra's blood and coated that Fury's talons with it. The second those talons pierced your flesh, this fight was over."

"You're working for Lord…" Batman growled, fighting the numbness that rapidly crept over his body. "But who is Lord working for?"

"You still haven't put that one together?" Deathstroke took a casual step toward the dark knight, "So much for the world's greatest detective."

Deathstroke flung himself at Batman, machete in hand. Batman attempt to react, but his reflexes were slowed by the toxin, and he was barely able to evade at all. The machete sunk into Batman's shoulder, and immediately a dark crimson pool stained his suit, blood seeping from the wound as Deathstroke twisted the blade.

Batman, working through the pain, withdrew a tazer from his utility belt and jammed the device into Deathstroke's abdomen. While his armor protected him from the majority of the shock, it jolted him enough for Batman to pull away from the blade and deliver a powerful kick to the assassin's stomach. Deathstroke stumbled but did not fall.

Batman began to flee, but the poison was causing his muscles to fail now, and he stumbled across the rooftop haphazardly, leaving a stream of blood behind him. Deathstroke drew a pistol and fired off several rounds into Batman's legs, dropping the hero. Deathstroke approached slowly, confidently, and ran a knife down Batman's cheek, drawing a crimson teardrop.

"I've wanted to do this for so long…"

Suddenly, a beeper sounded on Deathstroke's uniform. Deathstroke pressed a button on his headset, and listened to a message for a moment before sighing. "Well, the bad news is that Lord changed his mind. He wants you alive for the time being." Deathstroke raised his fist and delivered a powerful punch into the weakened Batman's face, knocking the dark knight into unconsciousness.

**Lord Headquarters**

"Originally, I thought that the Amazons' immortality was derived from an internal source," Dr. Hamilton began, "But then I uncovered something startling… when I pressed my Nth metal scalpel into a small field around the test subject's body, there appeared to be some sort of compulsory feedback… an unexpected reaction. Nth metal is known to possess properties that do not interact favorably with magical forces. So, the only conclusion I could draw… is that there was some sort of magical barrier around the test subject. As a scientist, the dark arts are not my forte, but I was able to get a decent read on the energy signature after several trial runs. I found that the Amazon's body seems to draw from some otherworldly force… and this force is what prevents them from naturally aging past a certain point."

"Other worldly?" Maxwell Lord frowned, "I'm not sure I like what you're getting at, doctor."

"Olympus, Mr. Lord," Dr. Hamilton nodded excitedly, a grin plastered onto his face. "This energy that gives the Amazons their immortality is streaming continuously, directly from a separate realm… Olympus, the realm of the gods."

"I thought Olympus was on a mountain?" Lord still did not seem amused.

"Once humans developed the recourses to discover us, we moved it somewhere they would never reach," Ares interjected.

Lord looked to Ares with a dissatisfied glare. "You… how did you _not _know about this? If the immortality comes from the gods, how the hell does a god not know?"

"I had nothing to do with the foundation of Themyscira or the Amazons. For that, you can look to my mother Hera and my sister Artemis. They were the ones with their hands in the female-empowerment pot."

"So…" Lord looked back to Hamilton, "How do we harness it? If immortality comes from this other world, how are we supposed to replicate it for the general public?"

"You would have to control the energy source itself in order to direct it, Mr. Lord. You would need to go to Olympus and, for lack of a better word, steal it."

"How?"

"Defeating my family may be easier than it seems," Ares jumped in. "Almost all of the other gods have grown weaker in the modern age. Everything they are built upon has collapsed. Me, on the other hand… humans are still just as violent as they were before, and I am still at my peak. If we were to arm the A.R.E.S. corporation mercenaries with Nth metal weaponry, then I could easily overthrow my family."

"I wasn't worried about the power play," Lord began to pace. "In the situation of a hostile takeover, I _always _win. My hang up is how we _get _there. If the gods built Olympus to be off-limits to humans, I doubt we could simply march an army in."

"I have an answer for that," Dr. Hamilton smiled. "The Law of Conservation of Energy. Energy cannot be created or destroyed, but transforms from one form to another. Magic, at its core, is just a form of energy not recognized by the scientific community. This energy that feeds the Amazon her immortality… it transfers continuously from Olympus, but could just as easily be used to transfer back. If we could harness it in large enough concentration, we could theoretically open a gateway back to Olympus."

"How do we go about that?" Maxwell inquired.

"The Amazon's body has absorbed a mass amount of this energy throughout her lifespan. It continually circulates through her system and prevents her from physically aging. If we were to kill her, it would all be released suddenly… at which point we could harness it and use it to further our own ends."

"Very well," Lord said, "We kill the Amazon."

"What of the Batman?" Ares questioned.

"Deathstroke should be finishing him off right about now…"

**-Beneath Lord Industries Building-**

Diana had been returned to her shackles, to her prison beneath the building. She had become disgusted by the very thought of remaining in further confinement, but saw no opportunity for escape.

The hidden door, leading in from the caves below the compound, opened up… and in stepped Deathstroke the Terminator, dragging a limp, unconscious Batman into Lord's prison. Deathstroke spotted Diana in her shackles and said, "So you survived? I'm impressed."

"You have no idea what Lord is planning, do you?" She spat.

"I don't ask. I just do my job and accept the paycheck."

The elevator on the other end of the room opened, and from it stepped Maxwell Lord. He caught site of Deathstroke, and frowned. "You didn't have to bring him back."

"What are you talking about?" Deathstroke scoffed.

"You could have simply killed him and disposed of the body. I don't need to see it."

"I was about to kill him, when you sent me a message saying to keep him alive!" Deathstroke shouted.

"I did no such thing!" Maxwell Lord shouted back.

"Then what the hell happened?" Deathstroke growled. And then, the situation began to dawn on him. "Damn it-"

Batman's eyes shot open, and in a surprising burst of strength, he flung Deathstroke into the wall. Lord withdrew a gun, but in a swift motion Batman hurled a batarang and struck the weapon out of Lord's hand. Lord screamed, "How did you-"

"I was dying quickly from Deathstroke's toxin. It was a poison which I'd never encountered before, and I knew I had no way of counteracting it. Luckily, my COM link was on throughout our entire fight. The Oracle heard the whole thing, and was able to hack Deathstroke's radio, relaying him a fake message from 'Maxwell Lord' saying to keep my alive. Thinking that his mission had changed, Deathstroke was forced to give me the antidote. From there, it was a matter of pretending to be out cold while Deathstroke brought me right into your lair."

"Clever bastard…" Lord growled. "Slade! Don't just sit there, kill him!"

"Working on it," Deathstroke sprung from the wall. Batman whipped a smoke pellet onto the floor and shrouded the room in gas. While Deathstroke was temporarily blinded, Batman made a break for Diana's cell, and began to pick the locks on her shackles.

"You're releasing _me_? Why?" Diana asked.

"Lesser of two evils," Batman said. "Don't think this means I'm on your side. As soon as we take Lord down, I'm bringing you in."

"We'll see."

Batman quickly picked the locks and released Diana from her confinement. Deathstroke, regaining his sight as the haze of smoke dissipated, made a lunge for her, machete drawn.

Diana quickly evaded his strike and snapped the blade in half with her bare hands, before plunging the broken blade into his abdomen. Deathstroke let out a pained grunt, and his stance faltered enough for Diana to punch him in the jaw and send him flying across the room. Deathstroke began to get up, when Diana raced over and planted her foot firmly on the blade in his midriff, pushing it in deeper and drawing a scream from the assassin.

"Payback," Diana said, rubbing the light scar on her stomach where Deathstroke had stabbed her in their first encounter. "Let's hope your healing factor is on par with mine."

"Guards!" Lord shrieked. Footsteps sounded as a horde of heavily armed guards began to approach.

"Let's move," Batman ordered.

"But Lord-" Diana protested.

"Lord can wait. Right now, there's a small army coming our way, and neither of us are in any shape to fight them."

"Fine," Diana sighed.

The two retreated into the cave entrance through which Deathstroke had come. Batman tossed a grenade behind them that, upon detonating, collapsed the cave walls in around the entrance, to make sure they could not be followed.

Once they had made it a safe distance, Diana grabbed Batman and stopped him in his tracks. "What does this mean? Am I supposed to believe that you trust me now?"

"I don't trust anyone," Batman retorted. "But I do know about your vendetta against Maxwell Lord. And I know that he needs to be stopped. And I know that he's somehow got an army of monsters from Greek legend at his disposal, and I can't fight them alone."

"What about the League?" Diana questioned.

"The League doesn't know what you know."

"What do you mean?"

"You've spent your life preparing to take Lord down. You know how he operates. You know his recourses, the ins-and-outs of his entire operation, and more importantly, his weaknesses."

"You need my help to bring him down."

"You know the saying. The enemy of my enemy…"

"I'm not your friend," Diana eyed the dark knight silently for a moment, "But I will be your ally… for now."


End file.
